Process Implementation
As companies grow, the need to strategic establish implementation processes to help you scale to meet your business goals becomes inevitable. We’ve all Change Management: How to Roll Out a New Process Company a place in our role when the way we used to do things no longer works and we have to innovate. Necessity becomes the mother of invention – there’s really no way to avoid it in a healthy growing company.
The truth remains, however: implementing new processes at work is hard. It’s some of the most difficult work that teams do. Some teams struggle with change itself – it pushes people out of their comfort zone and sometimes there is resistance. Other teams struggle to develop the processes themselves – they can’t agree on the best way to proceed to improve the business process. Even if you can define a new process and make some headway on changing people’s mindsets, there is still the uphill battle for implementing the key processes that turn plans into action. Management teams can help their employees to implement a new business process in five simple ways to maximize their implementation efforts.
Begin with the end in mind. Starting with an Objective Statement is a great way to understand what process you are trying to establish, how you are going to go about it, and what result you are trying to achieve. This should clearly define the business process that needs to be updated and the business reason why it needs to be done. This establishes clear goals and objectives to determine a common vision around the new process you are trying to implement.
Most processes touch multiple departments. For example, the process around how the Finance Team handles expense submissions impacts Sales, Production, Exec team, etc. Gain input from those teams on how the new process might make things easier for them, get them paid faster, etc. Not only do they feel heard, but they are more likely to see the value of the new process and become early adopters. This isn’t just the human resources, strategic management or the senior management team’s sole responsibility – all of the cross-functional team members should be represented in the implementation plan if you really want to gain a competitive advantage.
As with any priority, you will learn things as you begin the execution phase. If any part of the new process isn’t working, have an open dialogue and make any necessary adjustments. New management processes will only take hold if they truly provide the value as described in your original Objective Statement. Did implementing the process increase efficiency as expected? Did you surpass your goals? Did you fall short? What can you do now with the new data available to improve? Start implementing those processes changes and continue working! You’ll get better each time you through this process implementation framework.
Following these steps sets the stage for the successful development and implementation of any new process in your organization. Successful strategy execution involves constantly improving business processes that align with your management system. Go forth and conquer!