Episode 9 · August 13, 2026 · Hosted by Sebastian
Value Streams: Turning Scattered Diagrams Into a Connected Landscape
How to organise a pile of loose BPMN diagrams into a landscape that shows how the business actually works. We set out the levels from landscape to value stream segments to business processes to system views, compared top-down and bottom-up approaches, and linked processes horizontally to follow the journey end to end.
The big takeaway
A process landscape should do more than organise diagrams. It should show how the business actually works.
A connected landscape gives people a map to find the processes that matter to them, while creating the connected operational context AI needs to become genuinely useful. You're not just organising BPMN. You're mapping the operational DNA of the organisation.
What we walked through
- 01
Value streams
Use simple segments to organise your BPMN diagrams around how value flows through the business.
- 02
The levels
Start with the landscape, then value stream segments, then business processes, then system views.
- 03
Greenfield: top-down
Agree on the top-level value streams with leadership first. Then use them to guide what gets modelled.
- 04
Existing chaos: bottom-up
Create the top-level value stream landscape, then thread your existing models into it. AI can help identify where each model belongs, for leaders to review.
- 05
Connect the flow
Link upstream and downstream processes horizontally so you can follow the journey end to end.
- 06
Don't try to map everything
Pick one core value stream to start with and connect its processes properly, vertically and horizontally. One fully connected value stream will teach you more than a half-mapped landscape.
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