Best Practices for Managing BPI Projects

Six Steps to Success

Gina Abudi, Yusuf Abudi

• Publisher: J. Ross Publishing
• Year: 2015
• Print ISBN: 9781604270969
• eBook ISBN: 9781604277593
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Project Management
• Index: Business

While there are numerous project management books on the market and a number on business processes and initiatives, there has been a lack of comprehensive guides to successfully manage business process improvement (BPI) projects, until now. BPI projects are some of the most difficult and challenging to manage. Improving results for the business is not an easy task! Doing so requires understanding the vision and long-term goals of an organization. It also requires the ability to engage stakeholders and manage change. Best Practices for Managing BPI Projects is a guide for project managers who want to improve how they manage BPI projects. Using a simple step-by-step, six-phase approach, project managers and others involved in BPI initiatives will increase their confidence and their effectiveness in managing the complexities of business process improvement projects. Special focus is given to the necessary leadership skills required to be successful in driving change by improving processes within an organization to improve business results.

INTRODUCTION TO MANAGING BUSINESS PROCESS IMPROVEMENT PROJECTS

We often hear from clients that they are challenged with effectively managing business process improvement (BPI) initiatives. It isn’t even the size of the initiative that troubles and worries project managers, but simply the fact that a BPI project will likely be quite visible and a bit contentious within the organization is worrisome for project managers, and will likely entail many challenges. As one client, a senior project manager in his organization with 30 years of experience told us, “I cringe each time I am assigned a BPI project! I just know I am going to have a difficult time dealing with the stakeholders and keeping the team engaged.” And yet another client noted that, “The most difficult project I have ever managed was a business process improvement project—and I only had to work across two divisions in the organization! I felt as if all my experience in managing projects just didn’t prepare me well enough to manage a business process improvement project.”

The goal of this book is to prepare project managers, at all skill levels, to manage BPI projects more effectively and efficiently and with less frustration and stress. This book is not intended to be about the details of process notation and diagramming processes or other technical aspects of business process management; rather, it is intended to help project managers who are already managing projects to learn best practices for managing BPI projects. BPI project teams will always include experts in process notations and the fine details of diagramming processes. This book is to support project managers who need some best practices and want to generally improve in how to effectively manage and oversee BPI projects.

Follow the best practice steps provided throughout this book—from socializing the BPI initiative prior to getting started, through evaluating and measuring the success of the BPI project after implementation—in order to increase the success of BPI projects overall. This book will also provide information on the value and benefit from focusing on the people-side of change management, and engaging and motivating diverse project teams. A project manager’s ability to manage the people-side of projects—whether that entails helping stakeholders embrace change, or getting a virtual or remote project team engaged and motivated to contribute to the project goals—is absolutely essential to the success of a BPI project. Most good project managers know how to technically manage their projects. Frankly, that is the easier part of the project manager’s role. Likely the challenge project managers face in leading successful BPI projects is in influencing those around them to help achieve that success. Given that, this book will focus on the processes and procedures and important leadership skills needed in order to increase the chances of BPI project success. This book is chock full of best practices necessary to enable project managers to increase their comfort level and confidence in managing such challenging projects.

Let’s define two terms that will be utilized throughout this book:

Project: A project has a defined start date and a defined end date. It is undertaken to accomplish something—whether to create a new product or service or improve a process within the organization. A project may also be launched in order to hold an annual customer appreciation event.

Process: A process is an ongoing operation or work effort with no end period. Processes have the following characteristics:

• A starting point of the process and an end point
• Defined users of the process
• Business rules that govern the process
• A link to other processes within the business

Let’s look at an example of how a process becomes a project.

An ongoing process for the Human Resource (HR) department is the processing of external training invoices prior to sending them to Accounts Payable. Human Resource’s simplified process in place to validate invoices might include:

Figure 1.1 Invoice against purchase order validation process

As can be seen in Figure 1.1, when an invoice is received from a vendor, HR’s task is to validate that invoice against the Purchase Order or Statement of Work. This validation includes confirming the invoice amount and other relevant information, such as dates of service and items purchased. If all checks out accurately, the invoice is approved and HR signs off on it and submits it to Accounts Payable for processing. This ends the process.

However, if the invoice is inaccurate, the process does not end. HR contacts the vendor for a corrected invoice. A corrected invoice is sent to HR by the vendor, HR validates the invoice and, if now accurate, signs off on it and sends it to Accounts Payable for processing. This is a process as defined earlier.

Now, let’s assume that Human Resources wants to change how they process invoices for payment. They would start a BPI project to analyze the current process to improve upon/redefine and implement a new process. The project objective would be to implement a new procedure for processing and validating invoices from contractor trainers for payment. In this example, the goal is to reduce the time to submit to Accounts Payable from five days to three days of receipt from vendor.

Once Human Resources accomplishes this project, the project terminates and an ongoing work effort—a new procedure for processing invoices from vendors—takes over.

Many project managers often assume that if a high-level project sponsor initiates a BPI project, it will be successful. If only that held true 100% of the time! While certainly executive or senior leadership support is essential for any BPI project; this support alone does not suffice. BPI projects can get total support at the executive level; but if the employees (non-leader stakeholders) do not support the effort, it is destined to fail. After all, it is these employees who are most likely impacted by the BPI project and must work with whatever is implemented. Their support is essential. The organization alone cannot initiate, nor successfully conclude, a BPI project; it must rely on the people within the organization in order to accomplish effective and successful BPI projects.

A national manufacturing client launched a second attempt of a BPI project without considering the following two major mistakes made during the first attempt:

• Lack of engaging those on the manufacturing floor (the stakeholders closest to the process) in the redesign of the process, which caused the process to be redesigned in a way that did not work for those doing the work and, in fact, took longer to complete tasks than under the previous process
• Launching the initiative during the “busy season,” thereby causing those on the manufacturing floor to miss deadlines

Additionally, the project manager assigned to the BPI project focused on those stakeholders who were in his location only and did not bother to reach out to stakeholders at the company’s other manufacturing sites. Because he did not do so, he neglected to learn that what works at one site does not necessarily work at another.

Attempt two of the project also failed. Attempt three is being planned currently. What a scary endeavor! A new project manager has been assigned and as her first task, before the project is officially launched, she will be reaching out to all stakeholders at all sites to begin to build relationships and smooth the path to a successful BPI project. She knows that unless something different is done, the third attempt cannot possibly be a success. The first step in relationship building will be acknowledging the errors of the past and explaining what will be done differently this time.

THE VALUE OF EVALUATING BUSINESS PROCESSES

Business process management is a focus on improving the performance of the organization by improving how the work is done within the organization. Effectively, it is looking at processes and procedures for accomplishing the day-today work of the organization, which enables the organization to meet its goals. This might include how sales are made to customers, how products are manufactured or sourced, and how clients are invoiced for services provided. Individuals who focus on business process management regularly evaluate how the work is getting accomplished and look for better ways to get the work done—in less time, with fewer resources, more efficiently, and more effectively. They look for ways to enhance processes to improve customer service and satisfaction, increase revenues, improve profitability, and reduce costs.

Too often organizations launch an evaluation of their business processes after something has gone wrong in the business. For example, the organization may have lost key customers or are finding that their products and services no longer meet customer needs and they are losing market share. Or maybe no changes have been made as to how products are manufactured, thereby making product lines unprofitable. Not often enough is the culture of continuous evaluation of business processes considered something that must be done. When companies plan for regular evaluation of business processes, it enables stakeholders to more effectively engage and adapt when the organization does launch a formal, complex BPI project. It enables the adoption of a culture of continuous change within the organization. BPI projects are change initiatives that require not just the employees to change how they work, but also require the business to change how things get done in support of their clients and how the organization needs to support their employees’ efforts. This may entail changes to technology or other systems that are required for running the organization. When BPI projects cross a number of divisions or functions within the organization—especially within merged organizations or organizations with global offices—it likely will necessitate culture change. Culture change is not an easy task, and certainly not one that should be undertaken without considerable planning. For wide-scale BPI projects to be effective over the long term (and have sticking power), organizations must consider the organizational culture, and review how that culture might change or adapt to support the BPI project.

Culture change is a necessity, at some point, for every organization. As organizations change—they grow or contract; launch new products or services, or retire others; change leadership or representatives on Boards of Directors; or face new competition in the market—they are forced to change how they work, think, and meet the needs of clients. This can be dramatic for many stakeholders. Managing change on BPI projects does not simply mean managing changes that occur on the BPI project, but also entails managing stakeholder expectations around change itself.

Chapter 10 will focus on best practices for developing a culture of continuous improvement through evaluating business processes on a regular basis.

THE IMPACT OF EMPLOYEES’ PAST EXPERIENCES WITH BPI PROJECTS

What is important to realize when a BPI project is launched is that the project is not evaluated or considered on its own. It is unlikely the project management is starting with a clean slate. Every stakeholder involved, or impacted by, the BPI project is thinking about past initiatives in which they have been involved—and I guarantee that they were not all successful projects. For those stakeholders and team members involved in unsuccessful BPI initiatives, the project manager will have to manage perceptions of BPI projects that are negative at their worst, and indifferent at their best.

Past experiences on BPI projects impact how we perceive future BPI projects. If we have not had a good experience on a past BPI project, we are not expecting a good experience on the next BPI project. We immediately focus on all the things that could go wrong and how they will impact us personally.

The project manager must understand and manage these perceptions in order to ensure the BPI project is a success.

Within the Organization

Considering past BPI projects that have been launched and implemented within the organization should be a first step when undertaking a BPI project. If the organization captures and analyzes lessons learned from past projects, use this information to better prepare for the current BPI project. Consider also talking with stakeholders who have been involved in past BPI projects in order to understand what they believed was successful about the initiative and whether they believe improvements exist for the next BPI project. Undoubtedly they will have information to share. The data gathered should aid in increasing the chances of success of the current initiative, because the project manager becomes aware of how he must move forward with the initiative based on the last BPI project to avoid the same problems a...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Acknowledgments
• Table of Contents
• Foreword
• Preface
• About the Authors
• Chapter 1—Introduction to Managing Business Process Improvement Projects
• Chapter 2—Developing Your Initial Plan to Get Started
• Chapter 3—Taking a Project Management Approach to BPI Projects
• Chapter 4—Understanding and Socializing the BPI Project
• Chapter 5—Analyzing Current Business Processes
• Chapter 6—Redesigning Business Processes
• Chapter 7—Implementing Redesigned Business Processes
• Chapter 8—Rolling Out the Redesigned Process Organization-wide
• Chapter 9—Evaluating the Success of the BPI Project
• Chapter 10—Continued Evaluation Best Practices
• Chapter 11—The People-side of Change Management
• Chapter 12—Managing a Virtual and Diverse Process Improvement Project Team
• Summary