To Improve or Not to Improve

That should not be the question. To ponder whether it is nobler to stay the course and hope for survival or take action and make calculated adjustments that improve your processes is wasting precious time and resource. In today's business environment, we have to remain flexible to change. That change comes in many forms like increased competition, tightened regulations and changes to the overall economic climate.

Better management over our corporate information and business processes can help us to make adjustments and adapt quickly to those outside forces that influence our overall success. Imagine if you will that you are your own customer. Now look at the reason you are considering conducting business with your company. As a customer, what is the first thing you see and impression you get? What is the process you have to go through in order to purchase your product or services? Is this a simple process or a complex project? How much effort and how many steps do you have to take in order to get the results you seek? You should map this as you go.

Next, you should follow the process behind the scenes. Once the order is placed, what happens? I like to term this aspect, a day in the life of a piece of information. Once and order is placed, where does this information go? Who does it touch and why? What happens to it when it gets there and where does it go next? The reality is that there may be ways to streamline the process and speed up the processing of an order by eliminating steps that provide no benefit to the process. Have you noticed that we have not even talked about technology? That is because we can make improvements that will provide benefit even before we consider technology enhancements. This is not to say that technology should not be considered but we should consider the process before through technology at a problem. Choosing technology as a solution, for the sake of technology use, will not improve an inherently bad process.

So in business, to be or not to be is determined by your customers return business and generation of new business. How successful you are and how long you last will depend on how flexible you are and how quickly, your business can adapt.

Bob Larrivee -- AIIM