In the age of VUCA, corporate organizations and operations change daily to adjust to rapidly-changing business environments. Companies use ERP and other business management tools, but often do not understand the actual state of their own operations.
ABeam Consulting developed a new approach utilizing survey tools to analyze employee opinions and process mining tools for business data. The analysis visualizes business processes and issues that lead to effective business process reforms.
Data Driven Process Optimization Using Business Data and Employee’s Voices
Solution
Business process optimization by visualizing the reality of business operations, using various analysis tools.
Problems with the Conventional Business Reform Approach
In conventional business reform approaches, consultants conduct interviews with personnel and/or identify issues and develop solutions based on their experience. But to achieve an effective reform, it is important to adopt objective approaches to uncover data and understand the actual state of operations and adopting proper measures to solve actual problems.
The Approach Proposed by ABeam Consulting - X&O
ABeam Consulting uses the X&O approach to objectively visualize the actual state of business processes and accurately identify issues and
their true causes.
Use process mining tools to uncover operational data (O-data) and identify “what” is occurring in a business process
Determine “why” certain work is being performed with survey tools that share employee knowledge = experience (eXperience data = X-data).
Identify “what is happening” and “issues”by visualizing the business process
Process mining tools visualize business processes based on O-data (operational data that identifies "what” ). We uncover exceptions and inefficient processes to identify issues. For example, inefficient processes (such as frequent sales order changes, cancellations, and input errors in sales order operations) can be identified quickly. In addition, defining the ideal business process and visualizing ideal/not ideal makes it possible to visually compare where and how much the current situation deviates from the ideal.
Identify “why is this happening” and issues based on employee feedback
X-data (experience that identifies "why") is visualized through survey tools and analyzed to investigate the true causes of issues.
It also detects issues and potential problems outside the system that cannot be uncovered through O-data alone. For example, we will investigate why manual operations continue (such as operations conducted manually using spreadsheets and other software outside the system, e-mail-based approval management, etc.)
Value Added by the X&O Approach
ABeam Consulting has used their industrial and operational consulting expertise to develop analysis templates and methods that embody the X&O approach. Using this approach, we can implement support for business process reform in as little as three months in processes ranging from business data extraction, issue analysis, and studying reform measures to trial return-on-investment calculations.
Example
This is an example of problem discovery and root cause analysis for a business reform project using the X&O approach, targeting business processes from order receipt to collection. In this project, O-data analysis (operational data that identifies "what") uncovered inefficiencies in the order process due to numerous order changes. X-data analysis (experience that identifies "why") revealed the existence of unsystematic manual work that introduced errors and required additional work to fix. This approach takes advantage of the data characteristics of both X- and O-data. It is effective for manual work performed outside the system and for problems identified by employees. In this case, the investment effect was measured based on quantitative O-data, and is expected to pay off in 2 years.
Effectiveness of the X&O Approach
Business reforms based on conventional interviews can take six months to complete, as the process involves manual processing and analysis of interview results. The “survey tools” and “process mining tools” included in this service (and ABeam Consulting's original analysis templates and analysis methods) makes it possible to understand current business processes and consider reform measures in approximately three months. Our system provides 6.5 times more analysis checkpoints than conventional methods, making it possible to analyze the actual state of business operations. This promotes effective business process reform at companies and organizations.
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