Business Diagnostic

Strategy

How a 3D Scanning & Printing service provider started its journey towards excellence with the help of Process Mapping exercises.

ABOUT DEXIAN

Dexian Consulting is a Business Consultancy firm that provides wholesome problem-solving solutions to organizations. Founded in 2021, Dexian Consulting brings the best of management science knowledge and its application to everyday business scenarios.

What we do at Dexian

CASE STUDY ON ORGANIZATIONAL DIAGNOSIS

Despite a growing topline, management was concerned about the lack of co-ordination and performance within sales and marketing teams. Dexian was asked to assess the functions and assist with a programme to improve performance. Dexian orchestrated a detailed business diagnosis of the company by observing the on-ground processes, conducting unbiased one-on-one meetings with the employees performing tasks across various departments along with a holistic Financial Assessment.

Top-down approach
Comprehensive Report generated on its existing processes
Identification of opportunities for improvement,
documentation, IT Gap Assessment along with
Organisation structure study
Proposed Future state of the organisation

PROBLEM STATEMENT

Key decision maker’s participation in day-to-day operations left him with least time to focus on strategic activities. There were no metrics to measure the organizational KPIs.

Unclear boundaries within different teams created confusion among employees about their scope of work.

The problems on the surface which were visible to the naked eye:

The Sales management systems required an overhaul to productively and proactively focus the teams
There were lost opportunities for up-selling and cross-selling
Multiple employees were involved in doing same or similar tasks while at the same time there were a pile of tasks which were pending due to lack of focus
There was no visibility of various ongoing projects. There were orders which went unnoticed till the final stages of deadlines

Why are process maps important?

ROOT CAUSE ANALYSIS

The business diagnosis revealed that the current sales approach was passive. Overall accountability levels were low and there there were large communication gaps between teams.

Lack of Documentation

Key data capturing mechanism across various customer touch points was not defined, leading to lack of communication between departments.

Non existing standard processes

Non-existence of standard processes leading to individual driven processes and operational inefficiencies

Undefined job roles

Job roles in the organisation was not clearly defined, creating a visible imbalance between task and responsibility

The overall objective of the project was to re-align the company to its strategic goals by laying the foundation for a sound performance management framework and to achieve a cultural shift towards a pro active approach.

Principles of Lean, Performance Management Systems and Kaizens were harnessed to bring this shift.

THE INTERVENTION

A 60-day process study of the entire organisation was done with multiple interactions with the various team members across the departments. Sequence of events are listed as below:

As-Is Process Mapping

All employees were asked open ended but probing questions to discover the existing business processes. The findings were mapped into flow charts showing value flow and interdependencies.

Value Chain Analysis

Various loopholes in processes, IT Gaps, responsibility matrix, bottlenecks, documentation opportunities, ambiguous Procedures, redundancy etc. were identified and highlighted.

To-Be Process Mapping

Along with the team, rectifications were suggested based on industry best practices.These processes were incorporated as future state maps.

Realigning roles & responsibilities

Based on the future state maps, a clear demarcation between departments and the roles and responsibilities of each individuals was defined to ensure focus across all business activities.

RESULTS

Visibility of a possible future state devoid of shortcomings from their existing way of working has put the team on its course to Transformation.

Customer Centricity

A re-aligned sales and marketing enabled the key decision makers to be relieved from day-to-day operations and renew their focus on identifying the latent needs of customers.

Performance Management System

KPIs for processes leading to KPIs for individuals lead to a performance driven culture in the organisation.

IT System Integration

Revamping of existing business processes and introducing a robust IT structure helped in syncing the teams by automationing the workflows.

BENEFITS

The comprehensive process study exercise enabled the identification of a plethora of issues in the basic functioning of the organisation that were hitherto unnoticed.

Documentation and process SLAs

Detailed documentation formats were shared with the team as project deliverables to ensure that the organisation could plan its journey through a data driven decision making process. Service levels were defined for each process step. Stakeholders buy-in was sought and the agreed upon SLA’s were then communicated within the organisation as business KPI’s.

Process Optimisation & IT Integration

A fragmented IT system can lead to duplication of efforts, misinformation etc. The importance of having an integrated IT system, where entities could identify and talk the common language was highlighted and was appreciated.

Organisation Structure

A clear reporting structure minimised the ambiguity in roles and responsibilities and enabled a smooth functioning of the organisation. A detailed organisation structure was suggested based on the key processes and functions in mind.

Most of all, an urgency for change was created in the organisation. With this exercise, people were sensitized of the impact their actions have on the organisation as a whole and the possibilities of growth via small changes in the way they operate.

Strategy