Before Designing a Process, I Walk the Floor.

A process written in a conference room or at your desk describes how the work should go. A process built on the floor describes how the work goes. Those are rarely the same thing, and the difference is where most new processes fail.

So before I design anything, I walk. I watch how a job moves from the front office to the shop to the dock. I watch where people stop, where they walk to find something, and who they ask when they are unsure. I take few notes at first. Mostly I watch and listen.

What I am looking for is not what is wrong. It is what is already working. Every shop has ways of getting things done that people built over years, and much of it is good. A new process that ignores it will be ignored in return.

I also watch the people. Who do the others look to? Who gets interrupted most? Who has the answer when the system does not? Those answers tell me who a process has to work for, and who has to believe in it, before it has any chance of lasting.

Walking also changes how the team sees the work. People who are asked how they do something, and then watched while they do it, tend to talk more openly than they do in a meeting. They show you the shortcut, the form nobody fills in, and the thing they wish somebody would fix.

If you want to try this yourself, pick one job that is in progress today. Follow it from the first request to the point where it ships. Do not fix anything. Write down every place it waits, every person who touches it, and every time somebody has to ask for information. That list is the start of a process that fits your company.

If you would rather have someone walk it with you, reach out to us. Email us at info@devconsultantsllc.com or call (201) 540-7762.