End to end process re-engineering

Convenience processes are standardizable processes. They are essential to operate the company and nevertheless do not contribute to value creation. AP-AR accounting processes, for example, are often one of them. Redesigning these processes is based on the adoption of operating models and the identification of variants that are relevant in the specific context of the company. These standards are often independent from industries and effort to adapt them must be almost nil. The approach aims to reduce all the organizational and management rules that limit this adoption. It endeavors to deliver a target operated with at least the same efficiency.

Industry standards reflect the functional specificities of a business sector, for example maintenance of distribution networks in the energy sector. Re-engineering these processes aims to put the company at least on the same level as its industry peers, by converging towards industry standards that will be marginally adapted to the company’s context. The approach makes it possible to qualify deviations from the industry standard in order to differentiate the part of the target process that will have to be adapted to meet the standard and the part that will remain specific to the company.

Finally, the design of processes that provide a competitive advantage for the company induces an in-depth immersion in the founding requirements of these processes. This immersion sometimes leads to observations or field investigations. The identification and characterization of the differentiating solutions operated on the field results from this approach. The redesign of these processes uses these inputs, selecting the practices that have the best impact, that are scalable and mutualizable. The effort then consists in taking them to a higher degree of optimization.

Convenience processes account for 60–70% of the total processes, industry standards for 25–30%, and processes with a competitive advantage for 5–10%. The re-engineering effort must be inversely proportional. The nature of the effort varies with the category of process.

The deployment of convenience processes is essentially a matter of adopting new practices.

The implementation of industry standards is largely about the changing for standard practices. For these industry-standard processes, the design effort is measured and essentially consists in upgrading to acknowledged repositories. The approach focuses on qualifying deviations from the industry standard in order to differentiate the part of the target process that will have to be adapted to meet the standard and the part that will remain specific to the company.

Processes with a competitive advantage are good candidates to enter a process of continuous improvement. The initial effort made as part of a redesign project lays an evolutive foundation, it is designed and deployed in this direction.

The design of all categories of processes imperatively integrates the issue of user experience.

Harmonizing convenience processes leads to a sharp reduction in the diversity of process variants. The teams operating these processes are significantly impacted by change, while these teams often have a limited capacity to adopt new practices.

In the same way, the attainable degree of standardization of industry processes is conditioned by the ability of the teams to adopt renewed standards.

The redesign of differentiating processes can inherently lead to profound changes infused with innovation.

In summary, the intensity and depth of the transformation depend on the company’s ability to harmonize, standardize and innovate.
It is therefore by working on aligning its ambition and its ability to change that the company will be able to successfully engage in its transformation.