Processes: the white engine of every digital transformation
There is a lot of talk about digital transformation. The emphasis is often too much on technology. Fortunately, there are more and more voices calling for more attention to be paid to the customer and the employee in such a transformation. But there is another under-reported part and that is the processes.
Without a good picture of the processes that are affected in the digital transformation, it remains a fairly superficial exercise that will sooner or later fail. Because processes are the nerve centers of every organisation.
Processes are the nerve centers of the organisation.
Processes ensure that everything works optimally and that what the organisation produces also has value for the customer. No organisation can survive without good process management.
More than just organisational processes
By processes, I mean both customer processes, employee processes, organisational processes, and supporting processes such as information processes, HR processes, and any other agreed upon ways of working that help to achieve the organisation's goal.
In process management, too much attention is often only paid to the organisational process. Customer processes are not given enough centrality in process management, while the ultimate goal of every process is to generate value for the customer. Therefore, the customer process should be the starting point of every organisational process or other process.
Customer processes are not given enough centrality, but they should be the starting point.
Employee processes are also essential because the employee often has direct contact with the customer. If the employee is not served optimally, they cannot serve the customer optimally.
Supporting processes such as those for information management and HR are often isolated within the overall customer and organisational processes. This is strange because the name 'supporting' already indicates how important they are.
The challenge is to get a handle on your processes
Process management follows a life cycle, from identifying and discovering processes, to analysing and improving, and through simulating and implementing to observing and returning to the life cycle.
By following this life cycle in process management, you can get a better handle on the processes in your organisation. And that provides a foundation for a successful digital transformation.
