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Process Improvement

Process improvement is a systematic method aimed at enhancing business processes' efficiency and effectiveness through defined phases: define, measure, analyze, improve, and control. Key goals include understanding existing processes, improving quality, reducing costs, and addressing various process attributes such as reliability and maintainability. The document emphasizes the importance of process quality in determining product quality and outlines the need for process analysis, modeling, and measurement to drive improvements.

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12 views14 pages

Process Improvement

Process improvement is a systematic method aimed at enhancing business processes' efficiency and effectiveness through defined phases: define, measure, analyze, improve, and control. Key goals include understanding existing processes, improving quality, reducing costs, and addressing various process attributes such as reliability and maintainability. The document emphasizes the importance of process quality in determining product quality and outlines the need for process analysis, modeling, and measurement to drive improvements.

Uploaded by

hicowex796
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Process Improvement

Process improvement is a systematic approach to enhancing the


efficiency and effectiveness of business processes. It involves
analyzing and improving existing processes within an organization to
meet new business goals or standards of quality, so organizations can
do more with less, faster.

Process: The five phases must be carried out in order, i.e. first define,
then measure, then analyze, then improve, then control.

ISO 9000:2005 is the document that records the definitions for the
QMS specific terms used within the ISO 9001 requirements, and
according to this definition, a process is a “set of interrelated or
interacting activities which transforms inputs into outputs.”
Process Improvement Goals
• Understanding existing processes
• Introduce process changes to improve quality,
reduce costs, or accelerate schedules
• Industry is demanding increased attention to
quality in general
• Most process improvement work focuses on defect
reduction and prevention
• There are other process attributes that deserve our
attention
Process Improvement Attributes

• Understandability - degree to which a process is


well defined and understood
• Visibility - process activities have results that are
externally recognizable
• Supportability - process activities supported by
CASE tools
• Acceptability - defined processes are used and
accepted by software engineers
Process Improvement Attributes (Cont.)
• Reliability - process is defined so that errors are
avoided or trapped before product errors result
• Robustness - process can continue despite
unexpected problems
• Maintainability - process can evolve to reflect
changing organizational requirements or identified
process improvements
• Rapidity - the time required to complete a system
from specification to delivery
Process Improvement Stages
• Process analysis
– modeling and quantitative analysis of existing processes
• Improvement identification
– quality, cost, and scheduling bottlenecks located
• Process change introduction
– modify process to remove bottlenecks
• Process change training
– train staff involved in process revision proposals
• Change tuning
– process improvements are revised and allowed to evolve
Process Improvement Activities

Introduce
process change
Analyse Identify Tune
process improvements process changes
Train
engineers

Process Process change Training Feedback on Revised process


model plan plan improvements model
Process and Product Quality
• Closely related to one another
• Good processes are usually required to
produce good products
• In manufacturing applications, process is
principle determinant of quality
• For design-based activities, the capabilities
of the designers are also important
Product Quality Factors
• Development technology
– for large projects with average capability this is the main
determinant of product quality
• Quality of people involved
– for small projects the developer capability is the main determinant
of product quality
• Process quality
– significant for both small and large projects
• Cost, time, and schedule constraints
– unrealistic schedules can doom the quality of most products
Process Analysis and Modeling
• Process analysis
– study of existing processes to understand relationships among
process components
– allows comparisons with other processes
• Process modeling
– documentation of process in which the tasks, roles, and entities
used are recorded
– best to represent models graphically
– several different perspectives may be used (e.g. activities,
deliverables, etc.)
– model should be examined for weaknesses, this involves
discussion with stakeholders
Process Model Elements
• Activity - (round edged rectangle)
– has clearly defined objective, entry, and exit conditions
• Process - (round edged rectangle with shadow)
– set of coherent activities with agreed upon objective
• Deliverable - (rectangle with shadow)
– tangible output of an activity predicted by project plan
• Condition - (parallelogram)
– process or activity pre- or post-conditions
• Role - (circle with shadow)
– defined and bounded area of responsibility
• Exception - (double edged box))
– description of how to modify the process if anticipated or unanticipated events
occur
• Communication - (arrow)
– exchange of information between people and/or machines
Process Model Example
Rôle
Post-cond ition
Pre-condition Test All defined tests
engineer run on module
Module compiles
without syntax
errors Responsible
for Outputs
Test Signed-of f test
module record
Input
Process
Module Module test
specification data
Process Exceptions
• Process models can’t represent how to handle
exceptions
– key people are lost prior to a critical review
– failure of e-mail server for several days
– organizational reorganization
– request to respond to change requests
• General procedure is to suspend the process model and
follow RMMM plans augmented with the managers
own initiatives
Process Measurement
• Wherever possible quantitative process data should be
collected
• Organizations without process standards may have to
be define processes before measurements can be made
(since they won’t know what to measure)
• Process measurements should be used to assess
process improvements
• Organization objectives drive process improvement,
not measurements

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