Stage 1 · See · 01 · 25 min
From diagrams to a process landscape
You can draw a process. Northstar has about forty of them, and nobody can say how they fit together.
Week one as Northstar’s first process manager. The managing director’s brief: “Our orders are late and our process documents are a mess. Show me how this company works, then tell me where to start.” Northstar has 300 people, and its diagrams, procedures and checklists come in five different formats.
This module turns that pile into a process landscape: what the processes are, who is responsible for them, which systems they run on, and which one to improve first.
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1. Put the processes in order
What you do here: build Northstar’s top level, then place the existing documents on the right level below it.
The top level is the value chain: six to twelve end-to-end areas, each named “from X to Y” so it crosses departments instead of following them. Core areas create what the customer pays for, management areas steer the company, support areas keep everything running.
Where does this L1 area belong?
Order to Cash
Management processes
Core processes
Support processes
Below the value chain, every area breaks down in the same way. Your BPMN diagrams sit on levels 3 and 4: L3 shows a whole process, L4 zooms into one of its steps.
| Level | What it holds | Northstar example |
|---|---|---|
| L1 Value chain | End-to-end areas, “X to Y” | Order to Cash |
| L2 Process groups | The main stages of an area | Engineer to order |
| L3 Processes | One end-to-end process in BPMN, with lanes | Engineer and fulfil custom order |
| L4 Sub-processes and tasks | One step in detail: a BPMN sub-process or a work instruction | Final inspection as a BPMN sub-process; the torque test checklist |
Now sort what Northstar already has.
Which level does each document belong on?
Order to Cash
7 more to place
L1 Value chain
L2 Process group
L3 Process
L4 Sub-process or task
A quick test for any document: a whole process, several roles from a start to an end, is L3. One step of it in detail, as a BPMN sub-process or an instruction, is L4. Not drawable as one flow is L2 or above.
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2. Decide where one process ends
What you do here: decide whether Northstar’s three order types belong in one process or in several.
Northstar takes about 300 orders a quarter of three types. A case/function matrix shows which departments handle each type. The rule: order types that run through the same departments in the same way share one process. Types that are handled substantially differently get their own.
| Department | Catalogue order | Repeat of an earlier custom design | New custom design |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sales | ● | ● | ● |
| Engineering | ● | ||
| Planning | ● | ● | ● |
| Purchasing | ● | ● | ● |
| Production | ● | ● | ● |
| Quality | ● | ● | ● |
| Logistics | ● | ● | ● |
| Finance | ● | ● | ● |
| How it is handled | Fixed design and price list | Drawings exist, priced like a catalogue part | Engineering adapts the design, special materials |
| Orders per quarter | 90 | 30 | 180 |
Apply the rule to the three columns.
Catalogue orders and repeats of an earlier custom design: one process or two?
So Order to Cash gets two L3 processes: “Fulfil catalogue and repeat order” and “Engineer and fulfil custom order”. The second carries 180 of the 300 orders a quarter. It is the one you follow through the rest of this course.
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3. From lanes to responsibilities
What you do here: turn the lanes of the custom order process into a RACI, with exactly one accountable person per row.
Here is the process as Northstar documented it. The lanes already say who does each task. They do not say who decides, who must be asked and who just needs to know.
Northstar's custom order process in one pool with eight lanes, one per department: Sales prepares the quote and confirms the order, Engineering reviews it, Planning schedules production, Purchasing orders materials, Production manufactures, Quality inspects, Logistics ships and Finance invoices. Every lane change is a handoff between departments.
A RACI adds that: Responsible does the work, Accountable decides and answers for the result, exactly one per row, Consulted is asked before, Informed is told after.
Who is responsible, accountable, consulted and informed in each row?
Click a cell to cycle: R responsible (does the work) · A accountable (owns the outcome, one per row) · C consulted · I informed.
| Sales | Engineering | Planning and production | Quality | Finance | Process owner | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Prepare quote | ||||||
| Engineering review | ||||||
| Schedule production | ||||||
| Final inspection | ||||||
| Invoice customer | ||||||
| Order delivered on the promised date, end to end |
The last row is the one most companies leave empty. Every department is accountable for its own task, and nobody for the order. That person is the process owner: one name, accountable for the end-to-end result, with the authority to change how departments hand work to each other.
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4. Connect the steps to their systems
What you do here: link each step to the systems it runs on, and spot where order data is typed in twice or lives outside any system.
Select every system each step uses.
Prepare quote
Confirm order
Engineering review
Schedule production
Manufacture
Final inspection
Invoice customer
Two patterns stand out. The order is typed by hand from the CRM into the ERP, and three steps depend on email and spreadsheets that no system can see. Both come back as problems in module 3: retyping creates errors, and work in inboxes is invisible to the next department waiting for it.
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5. Decide where to start
What you do here: choose which process Northstar improves first, and be able to defend the choice.
Three questions decide it. How important is the process to the business? How badly does it perform (dysfunction)? How feasible is a project: is there a sponsor, data, a clear scope?
Five candidates, scored 1 to 5 by the leadership team. For dysfunction, 5 means badly broken.
| Process | Importance | Dysfunction | Feasibility | Evidence |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Engineer and fulfil custom order | 5 | 5 | 4 | 58 % on time; custom orders are 60 % of volume and the growth business; the managing director sponsors it |
| Fulfil catalogue and repeat order | 4 | 2 | 5 | Nearly all on time, few complaints |
| Issue to Resolution | 3 | 4 | 4 | 412 status enquiries a quarter, most about late custom orders |
| Procure to Pay | 2 | 3 | 3 | Some supplier invoices paid late |
| Hire to Retire | 2 | 2 | 2 | Works; HR system replacement planned next year |
A quick priority score is importance × dysfunction. What does Issue to Resolution score?
Your landscape, RACI and system map are saved to your improvement dossier. The next module walks one custom order through Northstar to see how the process really runs.
Reflect
Check your understanding
Three questions on the module.
Your BPMN diagram of the custom order process sits on which level?
Take away
What to keep
- Value chain on top, named “X to Y”; your BPMN lives on L3 (whole processes) and L4 (single steps in detail).
- Same handling, same process. Substantially different handling, own process.
- Lanes say who works; a RACI says who decides. One A per row, and one process owner for the whole.
- Map steps to systems to find retyping and work nobody can see.
- Start where importance and dysfunction are both high and a project can succeed.
After this module you can
- Structure processes on four levels, from value chain to sub-process
- Decide process boundaries with a case/function matrix
- Turn lanes into a RACI with one accountable role per row and a process owner
- Link process steps to the systems and data they depend on
- Choose the first process by importance, dysfunction and feasibility