Process Improvement is about investigating what causes things to happen the way it does in a process by examining all of the elements that affect the process, including the materials used in the process, the methods and machinery used to transform the materials into a product or service, and the people who perform the work. The aim of process improvement is to eliminate wastage of money, people, materials, time, and to create opportunities for the improvement of performance and customer satisfaction.
The key benefits and drivers of process improvement is to make processes work better, to reduce the costs of the process, improve efficiency and thus revenues, to improve relationships with customers and to improve employee motivation and morale. In a nutshell, process improvement is about making the organization’s processes more efficient, effective and agile in order to adapt faster and better to external changes, thereby making it more competitive and more profitable.
It is easy to understand the benefits of process improvement; what is not easy to understand is why so many process improvement projects fail or fail to launch. Primarily, this failure is due to a lack of sponsorship from senior management, insufficient budget and a lack of stakeholder buy-in to the vision. Failure to develop a Business Case to support the need for a process improvement initiative is another reason why process improvement projects are not given the attention and management oversight needed to ensure success. The Business Case describes the financial justification for the project in terms of the value to be added to the business as a result of the improvement.