Examples of description of the company's business processes. Advantages of describing business processes in the form of a model. Forming new values

Instruction

The first is to accurately formulate the name of the described process, which should be understandable and reflect the general essence of the sequence of actions that make up the process. For example, instead of “Filing an application for production and monitoring its execution”, it is enough to name the process “Product control”. The second is to correctly break the entire described process into smaller (“atomic”) tasks or sub-process functions and determine the sequence of their execution . With such a partition, the described process will be a top-level process. The level of detail of the top-level process may vary, but should be adequate to understand the audience that will use your description.

There are several ways to describe a business process. The most popular of them is graphic, with the help of made in various notations (notation is a set of characters to denote something).
The most common types of notations for describing business processes are IDEF0, BPMN, EPC (ARIS), etc.
As an example, let's take a look at a diagram made in BPMN (Business Process Modeling Notation) using the PowerDesigner CASE tool (Fig. 1). The main elements in the diagram are:
1. "Process" (function) - a rectangle rounded at the corners;
2. "Transition" - an arrow connecting processes;
3. "Decision" - a rhombus containing a question that can only be answered with "Yes" or "No";
4. Conditions - text expressions under which the transition from a function to another is carried out. Conditions are always enclosed in square brackets. Sometimes it's helpful to break yours down into "Tracks" - vertical or horizontal sections that represent departments of the enterprise or employees responsible for performing a specific function. In this case, this function must be within its section. In addition to the listed elements, it may also contain a list of data that are input or output for the process, as well as links to the rules or regulations according to which this or that function is performed. An example of a description of the business process "Product production control" is shown in Fig. 1. It is easy to see that this diagram is very similar to the block diagram of the algorithm for solving the problem.

The graphical description of the process can also be supplemented with a textual description of its subprocess functions in the form of a table containing the following columns: process name, subdivision (process owner), process description, process execution result. An example of such a description is shown in Fig.2. If further optimization of the described business process is expected, then another column can be added to the table describing the difficulties or shortcomings performed on this moment subprocess functions.

Useful advice

Always adhere to the rules of the chosen graphical notation for describing business processes.

Sources:

• M. Rybakov. Optimization of business processes.
• how to write a business process

The process as a phenomenon is a qualitative change that occurs with the object of observation for some time. Therefore, even before the description begins, you must indicate the object and the period of observation.

Instruction

First you need to describe the essence of the process, in other words, the qualitative change you are observing. For example, it caught fire, burned out, went out (the essence of the event is the combustion process). The change can be outwardly visible (the whole match has turned into a rod), the structure of the object, the system of connections can change, depending on what exactly you are tracking. In any case, when describing the change, you will need to specify additional time and speed (for example, the match burned for 20 seconds, the charring rate was 2 millimeters per second). Sometimes they add such a characteristic of the process as “cyclicality” (the change you observe occurs once or periodically).

Having shown the essence of the change, they usually go on to describe the process as a sequence of “states”. To this end, usually the whole time of observation with

A business process (process) is a cumulative sequence of actions to transform resources received at the input into a final product that has value for the consumer at the output.

With this definition, it becomes clear that business processes exist within every organization, whether formalized or not. The organization can accept functional approach to management, which considers the company as a set of departments, each of which performs certain functions.
In this case, individual divisions are focused on meeting their own indicators, but not always on the final result of the company, which can cause a conflict of interest between divisions and adversely affect the overall performance of the business. Theories of Constraints) between sales and purchasing departments trading company. The sales department, in order to increase turnover, requires to ensure the maximum possible assortment and maintain a constant availability of goods in the warehouse, and the supply department buys a narrow assortment of goods in large quantities, because its main indicator of work - obtaining a lower price from the supplier to reduce costs - has nothing to do with increase in company sales.

Advantages of the process approach over the functional one

Process approach considers business as a set of processes- the main business processes, managing processes (setting goals) and supporting. Main business processes are processes that directly earn money. Supporting - processes without which the main ones cannot exist. business processes, these are the processes of providing a variety of resources.

Each business process has:

• its specific goal, subordinated to the general goal of the company;
• an owner who can manage resources and is responsible for executing the process;
• resources;
• quality control and error correction system;
• process scorecard.

The totality of all actions to transform materials and information into a finished product for the client is called value stream. Value stream it is convenient to represent graphically - in the form of a map of business processes. The figure below shows company business process map. The map allows you to visually see the value stream as a whole, understand the sequence and interconnection of processes, as well as opportunities for improvement.

Technology business process descriptions makes all company operations transparent and understandable, allows you to analyze operations and find problems in them that lead to failures. The main thing is that business processes allow you to understand the interaction between disparate units: what, to whom and for what they transmit or receive at each stage. As a result, the process approach greatly simplifies adaptation of new employees and reduces the company's dependence on human factor. Importantly, the process system simplifies operating expenses management.

The presence of a well-developed business process systems greatly simplifies bringing the company's activities to meet quality standards ISO 9001:2015. In the context of Russia's completed accession to the WTO, the company's compliance with ISO 9001:2015 standards becomes an important competitive advantage.

The implementation of QMS in an enterprise necessarily requires the creation and description of business processes.

Business process development

Consider the order business process development. First you need to create a working team of the project from the company's employees. Usually, one working team is not enough. Then a temporary group of departments of customers and suppliers of a particular business process is involved in its activities, which provide inputs, outputs and resources of the business process.

In order to understand how the system functions and to preserve the accumulated experience, it is first recorded how the process actually functions now. It must be remembered that the purpose of the description is to identify the links between the actions taken, and not to capture the smallest details. That's why description of business processes it is recommended to standardize using standard forms and process charts.

The description of the business process can be divided into the following sections:

• Standard Business Process Forms
• Business Process Map
• Business process routes
• Business Process Matrices
• Business Process Flowcharts
• Description of business process joints
• Auxiliary business process descriptions
• Detailed description of the business process
• Business process documentation
• Definition of business process indicators and indicators
• Business process execution schedule

Let's take a closer look at each stage.

1.Standard forms of business process description

We recommend using type specimen standard form of business process description. This will allow achieving a unified approach to fixing the process by different people, which will then greatly facilitate the analysis of processes.

2. Business process map

Business Process Map- graphical representation of the business process in the form of a flowchart. Please note that each participant in the business process has a separate column. Lines are time intervals. The issued map allows you to synchronize operations and trace the path of information passing between the company's divisions.

At the stage of drawing up a business process map, the employee performing this work is not required to have competence in the field of the described business process procedures. It only captures the performers' knowledge of what and how they do. You need to get answers to the questions:

• What document ends the work cycle so that it can be started over?
• To whom is this document sent?
• What precedes this?
• Who is involved in this process inside and outside the organization?
• Who issues the task to start the process?

When drawing up a business process map, you should use the popular 5W1H question formula. Briefly, these are 5 W questions:

• Who? (Who performs this operation?)
  
• Why? (Why or why is this operation performed?)
  
• What? (What is this operation?)
  
• When? (When should this be done?)
  
• Where? (Where is the operation performed?)
  

and one question H

• how? (How is this operation done? Can it be done differently or improved?).

If the map turns out to be too complicated, this is a signal that there is no proper order in the management of the organization.

3. Business process routes

In real business processes, several departments of the enterprise often participate. For them, it is necessary to assign roles in the process. In addition, there are branching and parallel actions. Therefore representation in the form of routes is very convenient. The routes give us the logistic diagram of the process - movement of materials, people, cash and information flows. Flowcharts are used to decipher the logic of a command's actions.

4. Business process matrices

Matrix (table) of the analysis of the interaction of processes allows you to highlight the most important business processes, establish their relationship and assess the degree of influence of processes on the functioning of the QMS.

Process chain analysis detects that information is exchanged between all subprocesses. The process chain goes from the upper left corner to the lower right. The internal provider-consumer relationships are shown as boxes that indicate the requirements for the actions that were performed earlier.

5. Drawing up a block diagram of a business process

The process flow diagram is a visual diagram of the entire chain of relationships between all participants in the business process (consumers, suppliers and performers). In the process of drawing up a flowchart, the following questions are posed:

• Is the value of this business process comparable to the cost of its implementation?
• How integrated is it with other business processes?
• Can errors in this business process be immediately detected?
• What has been done to improve and ensure the quality of this business process?

6. Description of the joints of business processes

The most difficult thing is to describe the activities of the enterprise at the junctions of business processes. Consent between process owners is sometimes very difficult to obtain.

First write a description of the exits. Write them on the register first, then define the performance metrics and values ​​to aim for. Describe the process for measuring these indicators. Consider transitioning from these to other performance metrics that other users are interested in.

Then write a similar description of the inputs.

7. Auxiliary descriptions of business processes

As an auxiliary description, layout diagrams, mnemonic diagrams, Gantt charts and network charts . The last two are convenient to use for processes project management.

8. Detailed description of business processes

Expanded business process description can be in any form convenient for the enterprise, but must contain the main provisions:

• full name of the business process;
• business process code;
• definition of a business process, revealing its main content;
• purpose of the business process;
• business process owner responsible for advanced planning process;
• business process manager, responsible for the ongoing maintenance of the process;
• business process standards;
• business process inputs (flows coming from outside and subject to transformation);
• business process outputs (transformation results);
• resources available to the business process;
• business processes of internal and external providers - sources of inputs;
• consumer business processes - users of the results of the considered business process;
• measured process parameters;
• process performance indicators.

9. Documenting the business process

Business processes included in QMS system are to be documented. The most convenient form of description is a procedure. A business process can be described by one or more procedures, depending on the complexity. It is convenient to make a single view to describe all business processes.

10. Definition of indicators and indicators of the business process

The business process must be characterized by some indicators so that the process can be measured and its effectiveness evaluated. All indicators are included in 4 main groups:

• quality;
• lead time;
• amount;
• costs.

In addition, it is customary to single out special groups - a group of business process indicators, a group of requirements, a group to ensure the desired flow of the process, a group of recommendations.

Indicator group business process shows the degree of achievement of the goal.

The group of requirements includes:

• human resources;
• infrastructure;
• working environment conditions.

Group for ensuring the desired course of the process:

• information;
• work instructions;
• time.

• finance;
• logistics;
• suppliers;
• partners, etc.

11. Business process execution schedule

Large business processes should be formalized as separate document « Rules for the execution of a business process". The remaining business processes can be formalized in the form of regulations on the unit and job descriptions.

The regulations should include requirements to ensure compliance with the Shewhart-Deming cycle:

• determination of business process targets for the next period;
• analysis by the owner of the business process of deviations from the normal course of the process and their documentation;
• analysis of the effectiveness of corrective actions;
• reporting to senior management.

Development and description of business processes- the first step on the way QMS implementation at the enterprise. Ahead is constant and painstaking work to bring them to the attention of all personnel, analyze and, if necessary, implement corrective actions.

Just as it is impossible in industry to create a product without a drawing, so it is impossible to design a process without a description. A description is a “drawing” of a process, by creating which you get the opportunity to change it in the required direction, and therefore, manage it. To write a description of a business process, first of all, it is necessary to define its elements. These are:

Functions (operations, actions);

Events (some methods use the term "states");

Resources, among which, two groups are separately distinguished: o performers - roles, employees, positions, divisions o informational resources— documents, files, archives and other information carriers;

Products and services

Function is a complex concept, most often used when denoting the boundaries of employees' responsibilities. Since a function is a set of actions, this allows us to consider a process as a special case of a function. On the other hand, a process may include activities that are functions. In this methodology, these concepts are considered together. and are sometimes used interchangeably. For example, the process of working with a client is a sequence of actions, and the function of working with a client, assigned to the sales department, is a set of responsibilities. AT this case these concepts are the same.

Function (formal definition) is a subject-oriented task or action performed on an object, as a result of which one or more goals of the company are achieved.

There are three options for structuring functions in the enterprise

By object - object-oriented;

By process - process-oriented;

By Operations - Operations-Oriented

The object-oriented approach is that all functions that act on the same object are highlighted, for example, "order" (see Fig. 4). With a process-oriented approach, all the functions involved in the process are highlighted, for example, "order processing" (see Fig. 5). With an operation-oriented function structure, attention is focused on the type of operation, for example, "adjustment".

1.2.2. Developments

The concept of "event" has already been given in the description of the external boundaries of the process. It means the acquisition of a certain status by an object associated with a business process. In addition to defining process boundaries, events are also used in the process itself to indicate branches (options). For example, when performing the function "Checking the availability of goods in stock", there can be two results: "The goods are in stock" or "The goods are not in stock". In this case, these will be the events showing the direction of the process flow. If “Item is in stock”, then shipment may follow. If “Item is out of stock”, then the customer) is informed about the impossibility of fulfilling the order and a request to reschedule it to another period.

In complex information systems, the concept of "state" is more often used. State and event are always associated with some object. In the case of the "Item is in stock" event, a certain object (product) is in the availability state. In the future, the description of the states of objects helps to draw up requirements for the information system.

1.2.3. Resources

Resources are the objects of labor consumed in the process and the means of labor used in the process.

Raw materials, components, etc. can act as objects of labor in the process, and machines, tools, and equipment can act as means of labor. Resources also include labor, information, knowledge, etc. In this methodology, labor and information resources (in connection with their special properties) will be considered separately.

1.2.4. Performers

Performers (process participants) are employees who perform certain duties (actions) in the process, including external ones (not included in the company's staff, for example, consultants, auditors, etc.). There are the following types of process participants:

Organizational links - structural units— departments, etc.;

Positions - various positions from staffing companies, for example: Sales Manager, Logistician, Commodity Manager, Head of Workshop No. 1;

Employees - personalities, employees of the company (full name), for example, Ivanov Ivan Ivanovich;

Roles are separate groups of duties that an employee can perform in the process, while having certain rights. Roles can in a particular case coincide with the position - both in terms of functionality and title. For example: Ch. accountant, system administrator.

Organizational links can be used with the most general description business processes of the entire enterprise or to describe the functionality of the organization.

The use of roles is almost the same as positions. The difference is that one position can fulfill several roles. For example, in small organization CFO can perform the functions of both a financier and Ch. accountant. Or the programmer may also be a system administrator. In these cases, it is indicated that the position implies multiple roles in the organization, and role designations are used in the processes. In addition, when implementing information systems, everyone working with the system receives a certain role, characterized by access rights:

Administrator

User

Financial Director (in this case, not a position, but a role in the system that determines the rights to access information and the rights to use reports and other tools).

The need to use certain participants, for example, roles, is determined by the goals of the business process description, and through them - by the required level of detail. Roles are necessary to describe the actions of employees at the level of work with the information system, and departments at the level of analysis of the distribution of functions in the organization. When describing business processes, organizations mainly use positions. Only in extreme cases are employees (i.e. full name) used, as this shows the dependence of the execution of a business process on the personality of the performer.

Employees take different part in the process. The following types of participation in the process can be distinguished.

Performs (executive) - directly involved in the execution of the action, and if there are several performers, then it is understood that they are interchangeable and everyone can perform the action on their own.

Approves the result - usually leadership positions.

Contributes to - directly participates in the performance, but, unlike the execution (executive), the mandatory participation of all performers is assumed. In the absence of one of them, the function is not executed, since the executors are not interchangeable. For example, to move a refrigerator, two movers are needed: both perform the same function, but one cannot perform this function without the other.

Responsible for IT support - for example, a system administrator.

Advises this type of communication is present with the participation of external consultants.

Each type of participation must be correctly reflected in the process with the appropriate designation or described in the notes to the diagrams.

1.2.5. Informational resources

Information resources represent the totality of all data available in the enterprise. Information is a key component for business process management. When describing a process, the information used by the process and issued as a result is defined. There is also background information.

Information can be classified according to the following criteria: place of origin, processing stage, display method, stability, control function. Various classifications of information are necessary in the analysis of information flows. For example, determining the places of origin of information is the basis for the organization of paperless workflow with the input of information in the places of its occurrence. And to determine the places of occurrence, it is necessary to divide the information into external and internal in order to take into account the flow of external information and provide for its introduction into the system.

The processes usually use the designations of various documents and files. When describing processes for automation purposes, it is necessary to take into account the information carrier and detail documents to the level of fields. Fields are used as a place to enter data in a program that can change. For example, "Order" is a text document containing the "Customer Name" field up to 128 characters long.

With a more enlarged description, it will be enough to confine ourselves to the “Order” document. In this case, the "Order entry" function will be performed without specifying what data is entered into the system. At the same time, most business process description tools allow you to further refine this description if necessary.

1.2.6. Products and services

Products and services are the result created during the execution of the process and meet the requirements of the clients of the process. It doesn't have to be a company product. For an internal process, the result may be a document that is presented to the authorities. For example, the result of the sales planning process is the "Sales Plan" of the company in physical and monetary terms. To this plan, the management of the company and the production service, which are the clients of the process, make certain requirements in the form of a format for providing, terms, etc.

1.2.7. streams

Representing the homogeneous elements of the process in sequence, we obtain flows.

Functional flow - describes the sequence of work performed and can be characterized by cost and duration.

Information flow - shows the movement of objects such as paper documents, files, database records, etc.

Organizational flow - a sequence of process performers in the order of work performed.

Resource Flow − It reveals the movement of all resources in a process. There is also an input/output flow in the literature showing the resources used and consumed by the process, as well as the products/services produced.

Flows are needed to analyze individual aspects of a business process. For example, to analyze employee workload, it is better to use the organization flow than the process as a whole.

1.2.8. Process description levels (decomposition)

Decomposition- a technique that allows you to represent a complex system in the form of several simpler interconnected, nested systems. This form of presentation allows you to analyze the process without overloading the presentation with elements that are unnecessary for solving the current problem. The depth of decomposition is determined by the goals of modeling and, thus, sets the level of detail of the process description. By analogy with planning, it is possible to carry out modeling and description business processes top-down and bottom-up.

In the case of top-down modeling, all system processes are described starting from the top level, i.e., the entire enterprise is first considered as a set of interrelated functions, and then individual functions are revealed in the form of interrelated business processes.

When modeling “bottom-up”, one process is selected (for example, “Order processing”), then it is described and further optimized for the set goals. Often in this case, the description of the enterprise system as a whole does not occur, but only a part of the system that interacts with the described process is described. In the future, such work can be continued by incorporating other processes into business engineering work.

Each of the modeling techniques has the right to exist, as well as its own advantages and disadvantages.

Description of the system of business processes of the enterprise "from top to bottom" requires a lot of resources. With such work, as a rule, established stereotypes break down, and often the results are difficult to implement without major changes. existing system. A detailed, preliminary study of the company's "mission - strategy - goals" system is necessary.

With a bottom-up approach, it is easier to build a team and make improvements in a short amount of time, but these improvements will be local. For such work, it is enough to work out the goals of the engineering project. Decisions in favor of this approach are made on the basis of lower costs and the opportunity to test efficiency. new technology without much risk to the company as a whole. In the future, a trained team of employees can be used to spread the experience of the project to the rest of the company. This technique describes just such an approach to business engineering.

What is multilevel business process modeling? A function (single action) of a process can be a separate process and is disclosed by the level below as a separate process consisting of several operations.

Thus, by increasing the detail of the description of business processes, it is possible to form a structural "nesting" of business processes. Such a structure is a process model of an enterprise and should contain a description of business processes, defining their relationships.

The level of detail of the description of a particular business process is dictated by the need to ensure the quality of understanding of the business process. If any step of the process at a given level of detail remains unclear, the detail of the description is increased. If this level of detail is sufficient for an unambiguous understanding of the business process (which determines the convenience and efficiency of working with it), then there is no need to increase the level of detail (in order to save resources).

The existing practice of building control systems includes several approaches to the organization of control systems. The most famous of them are systems built on the management of functions and management of business processes of the organization.

Buisness process- a sequence of actions (sub-processes) aimed at obtaining a given result that is valuable to the organization.

Buisness process

Management systems built on the principles of function management are a hierarchical pyramidal structure of departments grouped according to the functions performed. A functional unit can be understood as a group of experts in a given functional area. In organizations built on this principle, management is carried out on administrative-command principles. Another approach to building management systems is to manage the workflows or processes that make up the activities of the enterprise. The process unit includes a coordinator - the owner of the process and performers from various functional areas, grouped according to the principle of unity of the result of the business process. Such systems are often referred to as "horizontal", meaning by "vertical" management a hierarchy of functional units and managers in a standard management system built on a functional principle.

The concept of a business process underlies the process approach to the analysis and synthesis of an organization's activities. The process approach allows you to consider the activities of the organization as a connected system of business processes, each of which takes place in conjunction with other business processes or external environment. Currently, the application of the process approach is prerequisite to build a Quality Management System in accordance with the requirements of the 9001 standard. Practice shows that a management system built on the principles of process management is more efficient and effective than a functional system of equal scale. However, the development and implementation of such a system is a complex process.

The key concepts of the process approach are:

Business process result- something for which the business process is carried out, i.e. activity is always considered together with the purpose of this activity - obtaining at the output of some result that satisfies the specified requirements. The outputs of a business process are often referred to as business process outputs.

Business process owner — executive, responsible for receiving the result of the process and having the authority to dispose of the resources necessary to complete the process. Often one has to observe purely formal results of the implementation of the process approach - The owner of the business process is appointed almost arbitrarily, he is not given real powers, for example, to dispose of the personnel necessary for the implementation of the process. In this case, there is no need to talk about any responsibility of the Business Process Owner for obtaining the result, and the very receipt of the necessary result is in jeopardy.

Business process performers- a team of specialists from different functional areas (cross-functional team) that perform the activities of the process. The executors of the process are more focused on the result than the executors of individual functions in the functional approach, since the basis of the motivational scheme in process management is the distribution of bonuses among team members only when the final result is obtained. With a functional approach, performers are motivated only for the performance of functions and are not interested in obtaining the final result.

Business process inputs- resources (material, informational) necessary to perform and obtain the result of the process, which are consumed or converted during the execution of the process.

The main issue that confronts the model developer is the principle of identifying business processes. Based on the definition, the principle of selecting processes is one - this is the result. When highlighting business processes, it is necessary to ensure that at one level of the model there are single-level results of activities, and, consequently, processes.

Buisness process

Buisness process (Business Process)- a set sequence of actions that requires a specific input, achieves a specific output and uses specific resources, which serves to implement a work or service for the client. In English literature buisness process is represented as a set of one or more related operations or procedures that together implement some goal production activities usually carried out within a predetermined organizational structure, which reflects the relationship between the participants.

What are enterprise business processes

General view of the business process.

The concept of a business process

The concept has become widespread in connection with the transition to a process-oriented organization and process-oriented enterprise management. Typical business processes for companies are order fulfillment, product development, company management, product delivery. In practice, each company has business processes typical of their field and interconnected with each other, aimed at creating and realizing the value of products and services. Be sure to check out the article How to build a business process in a company - instructions in 4 steps“to understand how business processes are created in practice. The complex will become clear and understandable.

According to the ENISO 9001:2000 standard, a process is a set of interrelated means and activities that transform an input into a result. Processes cause changes to the corresponding object.

Companies have processes various kinds, which can depend on each other and at the same time differ in many ways.

These options are:

• Kind of activity: production processes or services. The result of the production process is a tangible product (for example, machine tools), the provision of services is an intangible product (for example, information).
• Execution type: operational, i.e. ongoing processes such as processing, calculation, or dispositive processes such as planning, control.
• Creating value: direct, changing the object (mount), or indirect value creation processes, preparatory, or supporting processes (check, transport).
• Complexity: macroprocesses or microprocesses. Macro processes describe general processes in enterprises (production cars). Microprocesses - their constituent parts (body production).
• Commercial success: key, managerial and supporting processes. Key processes are specific to the company and are of particular importance to achieve the overall goal of the company.

Business processes are often a combination key, managerial and supporting processes (see diagram 2).

Key Processes(value creation) combine tasks and work to fulfill specific customer requirements using key manufacturing competencies. They are strategically important and at the same time specific (unique, because, for example, due to the use of proprietary knowledge, they are difficult to copy). These include:

• order processing and fulfillment;
• development, design and product design;
• production and installation, etc.

Management processes contain tasks and activities aimed at the long-term development of the company and the achievement of the company's goals.

These include:

• strategic development of the company;
• long- and medium-term planning in the company;
• staff development;
• investment planning;
• staff motivation, etc.

Supporting processes contain the necessary tasks and work to support key processes, but do not lead to direct value for the client, for example:

• data processing;
• Maintenance;
• logistics;
• administrative processes, etc.

The diagram shows the main typology of business processes in the enterprise, as well as their relationship.

Scheme 2. The relationship of business processes of the enterprise

Formation and structuring involves considering not only the typology, but also taking into account the level of the process (see diagram).

Diagram 3: Business process levels.

Process levels	Examples
Level 1 processes Enterprise chain	Organization of external processes, for example, a chain of industrial cooperation. Example: supply chain logistics process for production network enterprises
Level 2 processes Company	Organization of order processing at the enterprise. Example: Purchasing process in an enterprise
Level 3 Processes Structural subdivision	Organization of the order in the structural unit: Example: developing an order in the purchasing department
Level 4 processes Working system	Organization of order processing in a separate working system: Example: agreeing on the delivery time of an order by employee N.

To describe the process from a qualitative-quantitative, spatial-organizational and technical-technological points of view, characteristics (parameters) are used that are specified by the ENISO 9001:2000 standard. Process parameters - data to indicate efficiency and effectiveness, such as cost, lead time, quality, accuracy.

Related terms:

A business process is a periodically repeated, controlled activity, the result of which is some resource (informational or material) that has value for a particular consumer (client). The client can be either internal or external.

The business processes of the company are combined into a structure. This is a hierarchical model that reflects the links between processes and departments (including through inputs / outputs). If we draw an analogy with a car, then the process structure is a general diagram of the main components and the car system (suspension, body, engine, cooling system, etc.). The business process regulation is a detailed diagram of each node, with a display of each detail and a description of the operation of the details and their interaction with each other.

In this part, I want to tell you how to display diagrams of a specific node and parts. For example, let's take the business processes of an online store.

We will use the eEPC (extended Event-Driven Process Chain) notation. With its help, workflows are described - a sequence of actions to perform a business process, taking into account information dependencies and resources used.

eEPC notation helps to display workflows in flowcharts. They describe the work/functions themselves, the links between them, the elements of the workflow logic, the movement of resources and information, the resources used, the performers, etc.

Benefits of notation for drawing up the structure of business processes:
— relative simplicity for understanding and application;
- there are few strict rules in the notation and it can be expanded if necessary;
- its use does not require special software (although this exists and makes the use of this notation more efficient);
- workflows using this notation can be described regardless of the stage at which the project for the implementation of a business process management system in the company is (its implementation may not be planned at all).

Main elements

The main elements of this notation are two concepts: “Function” and “Event”. They are displayed as follows:

Figure 1. Main elements of eEPC notation

The difference between functions and events:

1.Function - some continued action that has some result.

2. An event is a fact of accomplishing something, usually has minimum duration in time. In this case, the event always initiates the execution of the function, and the function (except for the production of the result) ends with the event. Most often - the fact of production of this very result. And if it's not the end of the thread yet, then the last event triggers the execution of the next function, and so on.

Example. The user of the online store left a request on the site, and the store employee received it.

After that, he checked the balance of the desired item in the warehouse and received a statement of the balance. Then he called the client by phone, received the necessary clarifying information and entered it into the delivery log.
AT this example:

“An application has been received from a client” - an event;
"Check product balances" - function;
"An extract on the balance of goods received" - event;
"Call the client" - function;
"Information received from the client" - event;
"Create an entry in the request log" - function;
"Entry in the log of applications created" - event.

On the diagram it looks like this:

Figure 2. A fragment of the process of processing an application from customers in an online store

I note that each function must be initiated by an event and end with an event.

Usually sequences of events and functions are arranged from top to bottom, less often from left to right. They are connected by lines with guide arrows.

In addition to the two main elements in the eEPC notation, others are used. Let's consider them in more detail.

Additional elements

The following elements can be added to the notation:

Figure 3. Additional elements of the eEPC notation

You can expand the list of used elements as you like. But don't get too carried away, as this will make the flowchart difficult to read.

Figure 4. Variants of elements that can be used to extend the eEPC notation

Record in some regulatory document this extended list and the procedure for its use. This can be done in corporate rules building business process diagrams or in corporate position about process modeling.

Pay attention to the element "Information". This element is needed to display normative and regulatory documents, as well as to display intermediate or temporary information. Interim Information it is better to minimize it, as it is difficult to take into account and control. If this information is important - for example, a verbal order from management or the wishes of the client - you can do the following with it:

If possible, transfer such information exchange to a documented electronic form.

If there is no possibility, but the information is still important, I recommend introducing documentary duplication of information with confirmation of its sending from the primary source (manager) and its receipt by subordinates.

Example. Many have come across a situation where the leader gives a verbal order, which is then carried out. After that, it may turn out that the original leader had something completely different in mind. As a result, it turns out: the order was executed incorrectly, the performer lost time to implement it, etc.

Ideally, important orders should arrive at writing, and the performer must confirm their receipt.

Introduction to business processes. Part 2

But for various reasons this is not always possible. Here is what you can do in such a situation:

Introduce an additional staff position for an assistant manager, install special software to control the execution of orders, etc. Then all orders will take on a documentary form, have all the important attributes: deadlines, resources, responsible persons, co-executors.

If the company is small and it is not possible to “persuade” the head of the electronic exchange, you can try to shift part of the work to the performers. After receiving the order, he himself creates an e-mail with necessary information, then sends it to the manager with a request to confirm the instruction. You can develop a template for such a letter, or instead Email use tasks in MS Outlook, create a special Excel spreadsheet, share documents over the Internet, etc.

The same applies to information coming from the client. Having received a verbal wish from him, create an electronic document (entry in electronic document) and, if possible, obtain confirmation from the customer, e.g. by e-mail.

Without this, it is difficult to control the process and manage it if necessary.

To be continued.

Alexander Sagalovich, www.probusiness.by

Business Optimization Center real review

Vladimir Karusel

Business Optimization Center real review:
I want to protect people from another SCAM on the Internet!
I welcome you, dear friends, to this only honest site with freedom of speech!
For the inability to write REAL review about this organization, forced to do it here. I really hope this helps and it doesn't get deleted! You will not find a negative review or even an average one on the Internet. They just don't get published. I tried to do this on several popular sites, such as "Add" at www.stop-list.ru; on the "Social network of labor mutual assistance" at antijob.net; "Courier Finance" at www.courier.com.ru, assuring the population of their honesty and incorruptibility - not a single comment was posted about the Business Optimization Center, moreover, I spoke with their administration - no one is going to remove FALSE from their pages and continue to cover up criminals by posting commissioned articles about the "Business Optimization Center".

I found two reviews after they threw me, but when I go to the site where they were posted, it says that they were deleted.
There was an urgent need to acquire a company - they parted ways with partners, it would take more than a month to register + open an account, and then a ready-made company. I read a hundred positive reviews, and I didn’t find anything illegal in buying a ready-made company - the main thing is to re-register it later and that’s it. In general, after several phone calls and reading hundreds of good reviews about this law firm on the above sites - he transferred a large amount to them and the money disappeared. The bank gave me a transfer certificate Money, but the accounting department of the Business Optimization Center denies their receipt on the account, the managers hang up.

Chapter 4 Description of the organization's business processes

At the request to speak with the accountant "send" to write letters. All my phone numbers have been blacklisted and I can't get through. I consulted with a lawyer - all the information on their website is a marketing ploy and it is not possible to attract them for the "text". Do not mess with the Business Optimization Center!!! Too many scams on the internet! And most importantly, there is no way to fight them! I found people whom they also threw, they do not believe in justice and ours legal system and refuse to fight. Be careful! Buy any services after the conclusion of the contract and a personal meeting! Don't be naive! "Wake me up in 100 years and I'll tell you that in this country they still drink and steal" - a famous Russian writer.

Copyright: Vladimir Karusel, 2015
Publication Certificate No. 115112704421

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100% scammers. I had a need to use the services of these crooks (then I did not know this). I read a lot of good reviews about the "Business Optimization Center" on their website lph.ru. Just now I noticed that most sites with good reviews contains …..lph.ru. In general, I bought into this scam and transferred a large amount and EVERYTHING ... ... the money went nowhere. The bank issued me a certificate of receipt of funds to their account, but the accounting department of the "Business Optimization Center" denies the receipt, managers say - write. They answer my letters - our account is blocked. Your money is not visible. We wait…. I've been waiting for over a month. Divorce!!! Avoid the marketing tricks of scammers - lph.ru. !!!

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Description of business processes as a management method in an organization

Yandex is looking for an experienced specialist who will analyze and improve business processes in the commercial department.

Main responsibilities:

• description of existing internal processes, proposal and coordination of options for their optimization;
• participation in the development and implementation of work standards in the department and subsequent control over their observance;
• active interaction with colleagues from related departments, including the development of internal and external documentation;
• development and support of feedback forms for inquiries from internal and external clients;
• development and optimization of uniform criteria by which the quality of work of employees is assessed.

Requirements:

• two years of experience in a similar position;
• excellent knowledge technical means visualization (MS Visio - required);
• process performance management skills;
• Experience in managing cross-functional projects;
• knowledge of ERP systems and management processes;
• experience in conducting internal audit(would be an advantage).

You are a good fit for us if you:

• independent at work;
• persistent in achieving goals and able to work with resistance;
• have excellent communication and presentation skills;
• possess analytical and systemic thinking (the ability to divide a problem into its main elements, critically evaluate information, find solutions);
• you can see the structure in complex systems, as well as visualize it in a simple and concise form;
• strive to create and maintain standards.

Personal information:

Advised more than 70 companies in the field of regular management: from 10 to 9,000 people (including: holdings, chain stores, factories, service companies, builders, civil servants, web agencies, online stores). Student of Alexander Friedman.

One of the co-authors of the book "Social technologies of the Tallinn School of Managers. Experience of successful use in business, management and private life": http://www.ozon.ru/context/detail/id/140084653/

CEO

“Three paths lead to knowledge: the path of reflection is the noblest path, the path of imitation is the easiest path, and the path of experience is the most bitter path.”

Confucius

to whom: owners, top managers, executives

Process management through regulations leads to “hand through the foot” management

I have repeatedly talked about the benefits of regulations that solve such important tasks for business owners and managers as:

• minimizing errors on the part of employees;
• standardization of work quality;
• elimination of personal dependence;
• the opportunity for each employee to perform their work in the most efficient way.

And I rarely met a leader who did not consider the regulations useful. It would seem that the regulation is a panacea for all ills! But... Attempts to “govern only according to regulations” often fail.

Why? Now I will try to explain. Regulations- this is a description of any part of the workflow (sequence of actions) taking place in the company: either the entire process, or several processes, or part of the process.

Process(synonymous with “business process”) is a sequence of actions for solving a typical task (non-standard tasks refer to projects).

Manage processes effectively directly, and to formalize them, draw diagrams

Processes are divided into simple and compound. Composite- contain several simple processes. There are still end-to-end processes. This is the name of the processes, the different stages of which pass through several departments of the company. This is usually where their complexity lies.

If it is possible to manage employees within the framework of regulations, then managing processes through regulations is the same as trying to control a hand through a leg. Whereas it is much more efficient to control the hand directly.

In process management, their graphical and schematic representation (for example, in BPMN notation) directly helps. Before proceeding to the study of materiel, I propose to understand why the regulations are not enough to manage processes.

Why Regulations Are Not Enough

• Not all processes are linear. Many have multiple “if…then…” conditions. It is difficult to quickly understand the “towel” of the text of the regulation and understand how the process steps are related. For example, the regulations for the selection of employees are replete with similar forks at almost every stage. Depending on the position of the applicant, the interview can be held remotely or in person, with or without the involvement of his immediate supervisor.
• If the process goes through several links, the problem of “who is responsible for the final result” arises. In case of failures and jambs, employees blame each other and on circumstances, there is mutual responsibility.
• Employees can't get along about who is doing what.
• Due to the low visibility (still the same gigantic amount of text of the regulation), it is extremely difficult to optimize and develop the process.
• Significant waste of employee time to read, study, and understand the big picture and all the relationships. Regulations rarely describe the entire process. Often, a process that passes through several departments has different regulations.

Introduction to process management: what is the best way to describe a process?

Process management- a whole science. But I will purposefully simplify many things so that it is clear how it works. In short, the essence of the theory of process management is that all the activities of a company can be broken down into processes (unexpectedly, right?)

In order to understand how the process works, it is necessary to draw a diagram that will show all the relationships between actors(departments, employees, roles performed) and process steps. It should be clear from the diagram which stage of the process should be performed by which department, from whom the input data should be received to complete the stage, and to whom the result will be transferred.

Not all schemes are equally useful. In my opinion, there are important requirements for the process diagram (and, therefore, for the system of notation used, which is called notation):

• Unambiguous interpretation of the scheme by the participants in the process.
• The presence of a sufficient amount of training video material on this notation (notation).
• Prospects for notation: is it developing quickly, how much is used, will it be used in the future or is it already “dying off”

All these criteria, in my opinion, are met by the BPMN notation (version 2.0). To draw diagrams, I recommend using the free program Bizagi Modeler.

And once again about simplification. Starting to draw diagrams, you do not have to comply with the standard 100%, this will only complicate the implementation. At the initial stages, the main thing is that the schemes are understandable to the participants and unambiguously interpreted by them. You still have time to bring the schemes in line with the standard.

Total process diagrams solve the following tasks:

• Transparency. Both the performers and the manager understand the relationship between the stages of the process, as well as the area of ​​responsibility of which employee / department these stages are located.
• The ability to optimize the process by identifying the most critical and / or least efficient steps.

Do not forget to set optimization goals and calculate how much the resources spent will change for new version process!

The key feature of process management is the person responsible for the entire process

One of the most significant headaches for any owner and top manager is the situation of mutual responsibility, when no one is to blame for the incident, and employees and departments blame each other. How closed is the mutual guarantee?

There is an exit. When you see that you have an end-to-end process (for example, the fulfillment of a customer order), think about who can be responsible for the process, and who for a separate copy of the process.

Responsible for the whole process(sometimes called the “process owner”) - this is the manager (or employee) who is responsible for the refinement and development of the business process; resolving global emerging collisions and failure analysis; assistance and training for those responsible for copying the process.

A copy of a process is one of the implementations of a business process in practice. For example, there is an end-to-end business process “making a custom-made kitchen for a client”. Process copies are specific orders. In this case, the director of retail sales, and for a specific copy - the salon manager who oversees a specific deal.

If a manager encounters a problem with his copy of the process (order) and cannot solve it, then he turns to the director of retail sales.

One person should be responsible for developing the process and making all copies of it.

So there is a person who is responsible for the entire process(including for the work of those responsible for copies), but there are people responsible for making copies. Within the framework of process management, those responsible for copies of the process are subordinate to the “process owner”, and the participants in the process are in turn subordinate to those responsible.

In order for the “process owner” and those responsible for its copies to solve problems that arise, take care to empower them (for example, request information about the status of an order from related departments: delivery service, assemblers; make decisions when problems arise).

Algorithm for describing and developing a business process using schemes and regulations

It's time to move on to practice. I think that you are already on fire with the idea to draw diagrams of key processes. How to do this will be discussed below.

Stage 1. Draw and agree on a process diagram

1. Draw the process diagram with the process development manager and the experts responsible for executing specific instances of the process. Highlight the most critical points in the process. Each process and each stage in the diagram has an “input” and an “output”. When writing the regulations, consider what will be input and what will be the result of the work.
2. Coordinate the scheme with all participants in the process or heads of departments of the participants.

Example #1. Scheme of the process “Selection of employees” in BPMN notation

Example #2. Part of the scheme “Selection of employees” in BPMN notation

Stage 2. Write a regulation for the execution of the process steps

For each stage of the process shown in the diagram, it is necessary to create a separate regulation or subsection of a global instruction. In the regulations, it is necessary to describe in detail all the nuances: in what sequence the work will be performed; what small steps it consists of; what are the requirements for the quality of the result; what technology to work on.

An example of a description in the regulation of one of the stages of the process diagram

Step 3: Start Process Control

Questions arise: how to see the current stage of the process, the problems that arise, and whether it was completed successfully at all, or stuck forever at some of the stages? Or maybe it was completed, but half of the stages were completed with deviations and errors, and some of them were skipped altogether?

There are cumbersome (and useful for large companies) software solutions, in which you can not only draw diagrams, but also launch processes for execution. But on initial stage I would rather recommend to refrain from global implementations. Teach employees to start working with processes. Start with checklists in Google Spreadsheet.

In the future, switch to business processes in Bitrix24 or 1C. It is possible that they will be more than enough for your company.

Step 4: Develop and optimize the process to increase efficiency and quality

As I already mentioned, its “owner” should be responsible for the development of the process (I note that this is not from the category of “want / do not want”, but the honorary duty of the employee).

Any adjustments to the logic (connections) of the process, adding or deleting stages - perform first on the diagram. After the planned changes are agreed with the key participants in the process, it will be possible to finalize the regulations, checklists and make changes to the configured business processes.

Here it is important to keep a list of schemes for which automated business processes are configured, checklists are made and there are regulations (perhaps a separate table or a special area at the beginning of the regulation is useful for this). This will help the “process owner” synchronize changes at all levels, as well as perform them without redundant actions.

For example, in the absence of automated business processes, small additions of details for stages can be made immediately to the regulations. Unless, of course, these additions do not affect the links and stages in the diagram.

It is also important to inform about all changes in the process not only its direct participants, but also all stakeholders. Communication about changes is different in that people will see only the changes, and they will not need to study the entire regulation again to find additions.

Conclusion, or Why "everything at once" is the way to the cemetery of projects

You can talk a lot about processes, enough for a whole book. But… the cemeteries of dead projects are filled with attempts to implement “everything at once” on the most expensive and/or multifunctional software. At best, employees did not use the introduced technologies, or the systems turned out to be so cumbersome that it was impossible to work with them. At worst, the difficulties in implementation did not allow the work to be completed to the end.

And one more important point. If your subordinates do not fulfill the agreements, then neither the regulations nor the drawing of process diagrams will help you. The only course of action is to create a "hard" zone in the form of compliance with the agreements and further expand it. This will help.

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Allocate the so-called vertical and horizontal description of business processes.

With a vertical description, only the activities and their hierarchical order in the business process tree are shown. In this case, there are only vertical links between parent and child jobs.

The horizontal description of the business process also shows how these works are interconnected, in what sequence they are performed, what information and material flows moving between them. In this case, horizontal links appear in the business process model between the various works that make up the process (Fig. 1.2).

Figure 1.2 "Horizontal and vertical description of business processes"

Specialists in organizational design use different terminology when describing business processes. For example, a vertical description of business processes is called by some a functional description of an activity, and a horizontal description is called a process description or simply a description of business processes.

Ways to describe business processes.

Let's look at the main approaches to the horizontal description of business processes. Currently, there are three main ways of describing (Fig. 1.3).

The first way is nothing more than a textual sequential description of the business process. An example of a text description of a fragment of a business process is the following text: "The sales department draws up a sales contract and agrees it with the Legal Department."

Many Russian companies have developed and use regulatory documents in their activities, some of which are process regulations and are nothing more than a textual description of business processes.

For the purposes of analysis and optimization of the company's activities, this method is not suitable. The fact is that the description of the business process in text form it is impossible to systematically consider and analyze. Textual information is perceived by the human brain sequentially. For example, when a person reads the regulation and reaches its end, he almost always forgets about what was at the beginning of the document. The second drawback of the text representation of the business process is related to the fact that the human mind is arranged in such a way that it can only work effectively with images. When perceiving and analyzing textual information, the human brain decomposes it into a number of images, which takes additional time and mental effort. Therefore, when using a textual description of business processes, the performance and quality of decisions to optimize activities leave much to be desired, which is especially pronounced when the decision is made by a group of people.

At one time, information technology specialists developed a more structured approach to describing business processes. They proposed to break the business process into cells of a structured table, in which each column and row has a specific value. This table is easier to read, it is easier to understand from it who is responsible for what, in what sequence the work is performed in the business process, and, accordingly, the business process is easier to analyze. The tabular form of describing business processes is more efficient than the textual form and is currently actively used by information technology specialists to describe business processes as applied to automation tasks.

AT recent times Graphical approaches have been intensively developed and used in describing business processes. It is recognized that graphical methods have most efficient when solving problems related to the description, analysis and optimization of the company's activities.

It turned out that the graphics are good because the graphic information located in the field of view of a person is perceived by his brain at the same time. The second advantage is related to the fact that the manager is a person with right-brain thinking and thinks in the form of images. Any text information he lays out in images. In the case when information is presented to him in the form of graphic images, his ability to analyze and make decisions significantly increases. The book will mainly consider graphical approaches to describing processes, since they have proven themselves well and can be effectively used to optimize the organization's activities.

Figure 1.3 "Methods of describing business processes"

Description of the business process environment.

The first step in describing a business process is a description of its environment, which is a set of inputs and outputs of the business process, indicating suppliers and customers. Process providers and customers can be either internal or external. Internal suppliers and customers are the departments and employees of the company with which the considered business process interacts.

Let's look at the following example. In the business process "Search, selection and admission of an employee to the staff of the company", an application for the selection of an employee coming from the profile division, which in this case is an internal supplier of the process, was indicated as an input. As an output of the process, a hired employee was considered, who is sent to this profile department, and in this case, the profile department is also an internal client of the business process.

By describing inputs, outputs, suppliers, and customers, a horizontal business process description allows you to more clearly describe the business process and its boundaries. This is one of its advantages over vertical description.

Let's look at the following example. In one company, a vertical description of activities was carried out, within which a list of processes and activities implemented in the company was formulated. Among these business processes, there was a process called “Commissioning”. New employees coming to the company for a long time could not understand what kind of business process it was. An interesting fact is that employees who have worked for several years in this organization confusedly and differently explained its structure.

For a vertical description of an activity, this is considered a completely natural situation, since it is not possible to clearly define a business process with just one name. When this organization applied a horizontal description, within which the environment of this process was described, the following turned out to be. The input of the Commissioning business process was a requisition for a set of orders, which came from the internal supplier of the process - the sales department. The output of this process is a collected order, whose internal customer was the shipping department, which then delivered the order to the external customer. Now you can guess that this business process “Commissioning” is associated with a set of orders for a customer that took place in a warehouse. Only the description of inputs and outputs allows you to accurately and specifically describe the boundaries of the business process, and often it is almost impossible to do without a horizontal description of business processes in difficult situations.

Figure 1.4 "Business process environment diagram"

Classification of inputs and outputs of the business process.

When describing the environment of a business process, it is necessary to divide its inputs and outputs into two types: primary and secondary. This division results in primary and secondary inputs, as well as primary and secondary outputs.

This is done in order not to violate the Pareto 20 by 80 principle. The fact is that when the business process environment is described, the number of different inputs and outputs turns out to be very large, as a result of which the described environment turns out to be extremely large and saturated. This takes a lot of time and effort, while information of little importance for analysis and decision-making will greatly interfere, which in the future may lead to the failure of the project to optimize the company's activities. In order to separate the essential from the non-essential, the division of inputs and outputs of the business process into primary and secondary is used. To do this, in order to carry out such a division, you need to use the following definitions given in Table 1.1 and examples.

Table 1.1 - "Characteristics of primary and secondary inputs and outputs of the business process"

	Definition and characteristics
primary output	The main result for which there is a business process. It is determined by the purpose, purpose of the business process.
secondary output	A by-product of a business process that can be claimed by secondary customers. It is not the main purpose of the business process.
Primary entry	The flow of objects that initiates the "start" of a business process - a customer order, a procurement plan, etc.
Secondary input	Object flows that ensure the normal flow of a business process - standards, rules, mechanisms for performing actions, equipment, etc.

The primary input is the input that initiates the start of the business process. In the Commissioning business process example, the order set requisition is the primary input. In this process, when picking an order, the typesetters who pick the order use containers, which are also an input, but this is a secondary input, it does not initiate a business process.

When describing a business process, you need to focus on the description of the primary inputs and show them. You can forget about secondary inputs. They will be automatically described in the further detailing of the process, since at a lower level there are operations for which these inputs are primary.

The same applies to exits. The primary output is the output for which the process exists. In the Commissioning business process example, the primary output is the collected order. There were other outputs in this business process. If a storage bin containing a specific heading, turned out to be empty, then the compositor informed the warehouse workers about this, whose duties include the business process “Feeding cells”. This information is also an output, but this output is not primary for the Commissioning business process, for the sake of which the process does not exist. Therefore, it is secondary.

This primary-secondary toolkit should be used in order to simplify, speed up and improve the quality of work on describing and optimizing the company's activities. The rule for its use is as follows. When describing the business process environment, emphasis should be placed on the description of its primary inputs and outputs. Secondary inputs and outputs need to be described at a more detailed level when there are sub-processes for which these inputs and outputs become primary.

Description of top-level business processes.

Classical approach to the description of business processes.

After describing the business process environment, the next step is to describe its internal structure. With a vertical description, the work of which the business process consists was shown. The horizontal description stage describes the interactions between jobs, including material and information flows.

Currently, there are several dozen approaches or standards for describing business processes - ARIS, IDEF0, etc. At the same time, people who want to master the skills of describing and optimizing business processes often face the difficult task of understanding all this diversity and making the final decision about which standard use in this situation.

The seemingly complex description of business processes is overblown. The classic technology for describing business processes, which was developed at the dawn of the birth of process management technologies, is quite simple and consists of only two standards for describing business processes - DFD and WFD. Most others modern standards, despite other names, represent small variations and additions to the two classical approaches DFD and WFD.

According to the classical approach, the DFD standard, which stands for Data Flow Diagram, is a data flow diagram that is used to describe top-level business processes. In turn, the WFD standard stands for Work Flow Diagram and is a workflow diagram that is used to describe lower-level business processes. The workflow diagram has another name - the algorithm diagram.

Let's look at these two standards that make up the classic methodology for describing business processes.

Data Flow Diagramming - DFD

The business process description standard DFD - Data Flow Diagram is translated as a data flow diagram and is used to describe top-level processes.

The data flow diagram shows the activities that are part of the described business process, and also shows the inputs and outputs of each of the activities. These inputs and outputs are information or material flows. In this case, the outputs of one job can be the inputs for others.

The inputs and outputs that were shown in the description of the business process environment are external. The external inputs on the DFD diagram come from outside the process provider, and the external outputs go outside to the process client. When building a DFD diagram of a business process, they need to be transferred from the process environment diagram to a DFD diagram. For the final description of the business process, it remains to describe only the internal information and material flows. Each of them is the output of one of the works and at the same time is the input for another (Fig. 1.5).

Figure 1.5 "Data Flow Diagram - DFD"

When building a DFD diagram of a business process, it must be remembered that this diagram shows the flows of material and information flows and in no case speaks of a time sequence of work. In most cases, the time sequence of work coincides with the direction of flow in the business process. In the general case, this is not true, since there may be cases similar to the example shown in Fig. 1.6.

Figure 1.6 “An example of a time sequence mismatch

works and direction of movement of the document "

In this example, the second job started before the first job, but the document moves from the first job to the second. That is why the DFD standard is convenient for describing top-level business processes or macro-processes, in the description of which, in the general case, it is impossible to indicate the time sequence of work, since all work is performed simultaneously or there are several options for different sequences, which, moreover, may depend on different points vision. Let's look at an example of a business process shown in Fig. 1.7.

Figure 1.7 "Example top-level business process"

If a company uses a work scheme<на склад>, then the question of what happens before the purchase of products or its sale can be given two different answers, depending on two different situations. If a particular product is in stock, then its purchase in time is more important than sale. If, when the client contacts, there are no products in the warehouse and the client is ready to wait until the purchase is made, then the sale process begins in time earlier than the purchase, and ends later. Therefore, when describing this business process and similar processes, it is advisable to use the DFD standard, which does not focus on the time sequence of work.

When building a DFD diagram of a business process, it is also necessary to show the departments and positions involved and responsible for performing the work that is part of the process. It is recommended to assign a number or identifier to each work, and also to use two rules when formulating the name of the work.

Rule 1. The titles of the work must be formulated according to the following formula.

Job title = Action + Object on which the action is performed

For example, if this work is related to the action of selling products, then it should be called<Продажа продукции>, and it is even better to specify what kind of product it is. In this case<Продажа>is an action and<продукция>- the object on which the sale action is performed.

Rule 2. When formulating the title of the work, you should try to use a short and concise wording, which will increase the efficiency of further work on optimizing the business process. The ideal option is the case when the title of the work is formulated using 2-3 words. As a last resort, you should strive to use no more than 50 characters in the title. In complex cases, it is also recommended for each short title of the work to make it detailed description to put in the glossary.

When formulating the names of material and information flows, similar rules should also be used. In this case, the second rule is used without changes, and the first rule is formulated by the following formula:

Thread name = Object representing the thread + Object status

For example, if we are talking about products that were shipped to the client, then this flow should be formulated as follows -<Продукция, отгруженная>or<Продукция, отгруженная клиенту>. In this case<Продукция>is an object representing a stream, and<отгруженная клиенту>- object status.

Building a network of business processes.

In a project to describe and optimize the activities of an organization, it is advisable to develop a DFD scheme at the highest level - the level of the company as a whole. When identifying business processes, a business process tree is developed, in which the processes are classified into basic, support and management. The main objective of this classification is to facilitate the work of identifying processes, reducing the likelihood of missing important processes, as well as a visual representation of selected business processes, divided into small groups.

Another visual representation of a company's business processes is the process network, which represents a DFD diagram based on the business processes that make up the tree.

When building the business process environment, the inputs and outputs were described. The input and output of each business process is, respectively, the output and input for another business process or external entity with which the organization interacts. The interactions between the business processes that make up the tree are shown using a network of processes (Fig. 1.8).

Figure 1.8 "Development of a business process network"

Hierarchical relationships and classification of business processes on the process network are not shown in order not to clutter up the model. Unlike the business process tree, the process network provides a more complete systemic view of the organization's activities, as it allows you to show not only the elements of the organization, but also the interactions between them. In addition, the process network ensures that the developed model of the organization's activities is checked for integrity, correctness of identifying business processes and describing their environment. If the output of one of the business processes, for example, a document, is not used anywhere else, that is, it is not an input for another business process or an external entity, then this means the following. First, the described output of the business process is either erroneous or redundant. Otherwise, you need to find a business process for which this output is an input and refine the environment diagram of this business process.

In practice, a process network is often referred to as a network or business process interaction diagram. The difference between the process network and the classical DFD scheme is that it is necessary to show on the network the external entities with which the company's business processes interact - customers, suppliers, banks, etc. In fig. 1.9 is an example of a business process network for a manufacturing company.

Figure 1.9 “Example of business process network”

Description of business processes of the lower level.

Business process decomposition.

When building a DFD diagram of a business process, it is necessary to use the “7” rule, according to which it is necessary to choose such a level of abstraction and detailing, in which the business process diagram will consist of an average of seven works. The use of greater detail and, accordingly, the number of works will lead to a strong complication of the scheme and reduce the possibility of carrying out qualitative analysis business process. This, in turn, is due to the fact that a person can effectively operate no more than seven different objects. The use of small detail and fewer works in the business process diagram will lead to the fact that the works will be enlarged enough for this, and this will also reduce the possibility of their qualitative analysis and optimization.

If, in order to achieve the goals of optimizing a business process, its greater detail is required, then it must be done by decomposing the work of the components of the process. To do this, each or some of the work of the process is considered as a sub-process and described as a separate second-level business process diagram (Fig. 1.10).

With the classical approach to describing business processes for the developed scheme of the second level, both DFD and WFD description formats can be used, depending on the level and global scope of work. If the work is global and cannot be represented as a temporal sequence of smaller works, then the DFD standard for its description is used. Otherwise, it is advisable to describe the work by means of a WFD model.

If necessary, work on the second-level process diagram can be decomposed into third-level business process diagrams, etc. The decomposition of a business process should continue until the goals of its description are achieved. In this case, it is convenient to use the concepts of nested process or subprocess. On fig. 1.9 workflow diagram 3 is a nested process or sub-process of a top-level process. Similarly, workflows 3.1 and 3.4 are nested processes or sub-processes of the second level process.

As a result, the business process description is a hierarchically ordered set of DFD and WFD schemas, in which the top-level schemas refer to the lower-level schemas. In doing so, DFD schemas used at higher levels are decomposed or referred to as DFD and WFD schemas. WFD schemas used at lower levels are decomposed or refer only to WFD schemas

Building a Workflow Diagram - WFD

When describing lower-level business processes, slightly different process diagrams are used, called WFD - Work Flow Diagram, which translates as a workflow diagram. Additional objects appear on this diagram, with the help of which the process is described: logical operators, events of the beginning and end of the process, as well as elements showing time delays (Fig. 1.11).

With the help of logical operators, which are also called decision blocks, they show the alternatives that occur in the process, it shows in which cases the process proceeds according to one technology, and in which cases according to another. For example, using these elements, one can describe a situation where a contract with a value of less than a certain amount is agreed upon by one group of employees, and a contract with a higher value is agreed upon using a more complex technology, in the chain of which more employees participate.

Process start and end events indicate when a process starts and ends. For rigidly formalized business processes, such as budgeting, for example, time can act as events.

In cases where the description of a business process is carried out for the purpose of its further temporal optimization, time delay elements are used, which show the places where there is a time gap between sequentially performed works. In this case, the subsequent work begins only some time after the completion of the previous one.

In the classic WFD approach, documents are not shown in this diagram, as these diagrams are used to describe lower-level processes that contain detailed work, and by the name of which it is clear what is input and what is output.

Figure 1.11 "Workflow Diagram - WFD"

A distinctive feature of WFD - diagrams is that the arrows between the operations of the business process do not indicate object flows (information and material), but flows or the time sequence of work.

So, with the help of two classical schemes DFD and WFD, it is possible to describe in detail all the business processes of the company.