Re-engineering

If optimisation is all about ensuring that WHAT you do delivers your business’ requirements then re-engineering is all about ensuring that HOW you do those things is as efficient and cost-effective as possible.

The term re-engineering tends to bring to mind large scale manufacturing processes and in fact this is where many of the well known methodologies such as LEAN (Toyota) and Six Sigma (Motorola) are developed.  I have been involved in managing and delivering re-engineering projects since 1993 (back then it was called Total Quality Management if anyone remembers that one!) and my experience has been mainly within

• technology intensive service environments such as call centres,
• online processing such as web application forms and
• intra business processes such as HRM and ICT delivery and support.

Optimisation

Optimisation is the process of making a system or process deliver what a business needs as effectively as possible.  I’ll begin by investigating your business requirements and undertaking a gap analysis to see where the current system or process falls short.  I’ll review these gaps with you and provide you with full documentation of what’s missing, recommendations on how to fill the gaps and, most importantly, how to test that any changes you decide make will deliver what you need.

Case Study: Facilitating innovation

A product team had been challenged to come up with some truly innovative ideas for a Personal Loan product.  The Product Manager asked me to plan and facilitate an innovation day which would enable the team to think outside the box.

The first step was to ensure that the venue was ‘off-site’ in an environment that would not trigger business-as-usual thinking patterns.  I asked the team members what techniques they had used before for creative thinking and developed the whole day around methods that were new to all of them.  The final programme involved varied and occasionally shocking techniques such as Reversal, Provocation, Random Input and Concept Fans.  Between the innovation exercises I ran warm-up, team building, conflict and trust exercises to ensure the team were really Performing.

By 5pm the team was completely exhausted but very pleased with themselves.  They had come up with many flipcharts’ worth of ideas that they had never thought of before.