What Is Process Optimization? (And Why You Need To Do It Yesterday)
TL;DR
Process Optimization is about making your work processes better and is key to your success because:
Optimized processes are necessary for successful operations, helping you reduce the Cost of Poor Quality (COPQ).
Growth depends on the ability to scale operations hence the need for scalable optimized processes.
Innovation relies on rapidly optimizing processes to meet new customer needs and market demands. Therefore, Process Optimization needs to be part of your company culture.
The ability to successfully execute, grow and innovate is required just to survive in the rapidly changing marketplace. To thrive requires doing it faster and better than the competition.
While many processes may produce mostly good results, there is often a lot of internal rework done by those who work the process. The longer this continues, the more you prolong the pain of that rework!
Process automation has become a popular trend, but it’s important to optimize your process before automating it, so you automate the best of your process!
Process Optimization broadly refers to making a process better. More specifically, it relates to improving one or more specific measures of a process's performance so that customers receive greater value.
“Process Optimization relates to improving one or more specific measures of a process’s performance so that customers receive greater value.”
Measures of a process include:
Cycle time
Throughput
Yield
Defects
Labor
Cost
Anything that can be objectively measured
Process Optimization in Industries
So what does Process Optimization look like in a variety of industries?
Healthcare: Reducing the time of patient arrival to be seen by a care provider in a pediatric clinic. This is a cycle time Process Optimization.
Government: Processing more accurate vehicle registrations per 8-hour day. This is a throughput Process Optimization.
Finance: Reducing errors and rework in the monthly close process. This is a defect Process Optimization.
Operations: Reducing the time to pull from inventory, pack and ship a customer order. This is a cycle time Process Optimization.
Manufacturing: Increasing the percentage of good product output per batch. This is a yield Process Optimization.
“You don’t want to automate a flawed process! Kure will help you get the maximum benefit from your process automation efforts.”
Once you identify a measure to improve, Kure will help you precisely understand the process you’re seeking to optimize, identify the key drivers of performance and implement improvements.
If you’re considering automating cumbersome manual processes, optimize with Kure first. You don’t want to automate a flawed process! Kure will help you get the maximum benefit from your process automation efforts.
Why Do Process Optimization?
When you implement Process Optimization, you can expect benefits in:
Improved service and/or product quality
Increased operational efficiency and productivity
Reduced costs
Improved customer satisfaction
Improved employee satisfaction satisfaction
Why do Process Optimization now or sooner? Process Optimization directly reduces the Cost of Poor Quality (COPQ). COPQ is the total associated costs due to product/service failures, waste, rework, churned customers and negative impacts on your reputation. It’s estimated that COPQ is 20% or more of your cost of goods sold or 20% of your organization's direct costs. This is a tremendous opportunity!
“Process Optimization enables you to create an agile organization. Change is ongoing and accelerating. Changes in customer expectations, competition and technology require some level of Process Optimization effort just to survive.”
In addition to helping you create more productive operations, Process Optimization enables you to create an agile organization. Change is ongoing and accelerating. Changes in customer expectations, competition and technology require some level of Process Optimization effort just to survive.
That level of effort depends on your particular situation. Do you know how you're doing? Are you ahead, behind or in the middle of the pack? How fast are your competitors optimizing their processes? How susceptible is your business to a new competitor with a new, fresh approach?
Unless you’re in a unique situation where you don't need to respond quickly to change, you need to get started yesterday!
Optimize With Kure
Kure gives you the power to implement Process Optimization across your organization. Kure provides dozens of proven methodologies so everyone, regardless of experience, can achieve results like the Fortune 500—3x faster and with 100x ROI. Kure will help to rapidly and effectively:
Engage the workforce to implement Quick Win improvements daily throughout the organization, creating a powerful engine for growth and a culture of continual improvement
Solve complex process problems that are causing pain for you and your customers
Rapidly streamline critical processes to increase productivity and quality
Create new, innovative ways to accomplish your objectives
Manage day-to-day operational performance in real-time
Implement large-scale complex projects
Manage all your projects in one collaborative application and report on project value and ROI
Kure gives you the power to optimize processes like the Fortune 500 at a fraction of the cost—no experience required.
Try it for free today!
