1. Operational Excellence Begins with Process Improvements
In today’s economy, organizations demand higher productivity, better cost control, and
improved risk management to manage frequent market changes and increasing competitive
pressure. To deliver continuous business improvement and operational excellence, organizations
need to focus on their processes and manage them well. Process improvement can decrease costs
and risks associated with running a business. Operational excellence begins and can be achieved
through identifying and implementing process improvements.
Process improvement is a series of actions to identify, analyze and improve existing
processes within an organization, or to design new ones. These actions are used to derive new
goals and objectives, and systematically approach to assessing services and improving them on a
priority basis – beginning with mission critical services. Throughout the process improvement
cycle, it is necessary to keep customer focus, provide employee empowerment, and most
importantly, have leadership buy-in and involvement. Additionally, successful process
improvement plans include feedback loops by using data to inform the practice of processes and
measure results. Through a data informed practice in process improvements, decisions based on
facts are likely to be correct. Process improvements made after a thorough identification and
analysis on current processes, followed by feedback from stakeholders, can improve efficiencies
and excellence in organizations.
Process improvement in organizations can improve their operational excellence. Through
leadership, teamwork and problem solving, continuous improvement can result throughout an
organization. By focusing on customer needs, empowering employees, and optimizing existing
processes, process improvement strategies can improve and promote a stronger teamwork
atmosphere. When there are safety and quality improvements for employees and customers
through the improvement of processes, this does lead towards an organization to become a better
enterprise. Additionally, the elimination of “wasteful” processes can create a more efficient and
competitive organization. Therefore, the implementation of process improvement strategies can
improve operations, and increase the excellence in an organization.
Many process improvement methods are available for organizations to use. The selection
of the appropriate method to use can be a daunting task. The best advice to give what method to
choose comes from the “age old” acronym of KISS. There are many variations to the meaning
behind this acronym, but for the needs of this article, it is “Keep It Short and Simple.” When
choosing a process improvement method, it is best if it is kept simple rather complex. One of the
simplest process improvement methods comes from Edward Demming’s “wheel,” which is Plan-
Do-Check-Act (PDCA). Plan, is to establish the objectives; Do, is to implement the new
processes; Check, is to measure the new process; and Act, is to analyze the differences to
determine where to apply changes that will improve processes. PDCA is a cycle, which starts
small to test potential effects on processes, then gradually leads to a larger and more targeted
change. Another process improvement method comes as part of the Six Sigma practices, which is
Define, Measure, Analyze, Design, and Verify. Define, is to identify goals consistent with
customer demands; Measure is to identify capabilities and risks; Analyze is to design alternatives
and designs, and evaluate the capability to select the best design; Design, to optimize and verify
a design; and Verify, through pilot runs, is to verify the new process in production with the

2. process owners. Either methodology used is a good foundation to begin process improvements.
However, the needs of the organization may determine that a more complex strategy is necessary
to complete process improvements. The most important thing is to identify a methodology as
soon as possibly, and then begin collecting the hard data that is necessary for analysis.
Once a process improvement methodology is selected, the next step is to identify the
business objectives to solve the problems in processes. The first thing to do is to generate a list of
organizational problems and to find the “bottle necks” in the process flows. When creating the
list, it is best to group interrelated problems together, such as things that cause employee issues,
things that waste time, low productivity, redundancies, and so on. This will help to prioritize
which processes need to be attended to first. After the problem processes have been identified,
the process improvement team needs to identify the steps in the process causing issues. There are
many methods available to help identify the problems in a process, such as brainstorming, flow
charts, cause and effect diagrams (a.k.a fishbone or Ishakawa diagrams), and root cause analysis.
Next, a process improvement plan should be created based on the organization’s goals and
problems, or objectives, and tie improvement activities to project work. With this approach,
improvement focuses on the issues of the organization and each process change is based or
driven by a specific need. This objective oriented approach will help to keep process
improvements focused on issues that an organization wants to have fixed immediately.
The success of any process improvement plan is dependent on the quality of its team
members. Effective teams are required for process improvement plans to succeed – the team is
the engine that delivers successful process improvement changes. First, all team members should
be trained on whatever improvement methodology is chosen. Next, the team should have a clear
and defined purpose concerning a process improvement plan. Much like project management, the
process improvement team should have great communication, be cross-functional and have
representation of all stakeholders of the process. It is also important to empower the team as
much as possible to make all required decisions; else, process changes may take longer to
implement. Finally, it is important that team members have good change management skills,
because changes and decisions during a process improvement phase are sure to come. Thus, a
project improvement plan can succeed if an effective team is organized, trained, and empowered.
Even though there may be an effective team organized, there are still challenges to any
process improvement plan. One challenge is the amount of process improvement methods that
are available - there are a several methods to choose from to use for process improvement
changes. It is important to pick one as quickly as possible that will be effective for the team,
gather hard information, and getting an accurate view of the current processes. Another
challenge is that processes may be too rigid and inflexible to change. However, good processes
are always flexible, not bureaucratic, and can provide the control and information needed to
facilitate improvements. Lastly, but not all-inclusive, there is the challenge of getting leadership
“buy-in” for any proposed process improvement changes. Part of this challenge is in how much
empowerment is given to the process improvement team, but there other factors that will help to
sell the plan to process owners or leaders. The team needs to completely disclose the objectives
for the process change, give realistic goal settings and schedules, show projected return on
investment, and provide customer surveys of processes. Therefore, proper planning can
overcome many challenges opposing process improvement changes.

3. Operational excellence does begin and can be achieved through process improvements
once a method is selected, the objectives and goals are clearly defined, and an effective team is
established. Cost and risks can be reduced by removing waste, overhead, and redundancy to
improve processes, thus increasing operational excellence. Operational excellence in
organizations can improve value delivered to customers, employees and stakeholders by
indentifying and implementing process improvements that will increase efficiency and
effectiveness. In closing, University of Louisville basketball coach once said, “Excellence is the
unlimited ability to improve the quality of what you have to offer.” Thus, an organization, too,
can achieve excellence if they can improve the quality of processes.