You want to find that new restaurant downtown that everyone has been raving about, but you've never even heard of the little side street it calls home. What do you do?
You break out a map and figure out how to get from your front door to the restaurant. You look it up on Google maps, type the address into your GPS system or, if you're old school, you reach for that folded up paper map you keep in the back of the utility drawer.
You don't just hop into the car and head off in the general direction of downtown. If that's your plan, you can count on the night ending in frustration and a trip by a drive-through window.
Maps are our friends. That principle doesn't just apply to that new Spanish joint with the great tapas, either. It's a key part of doing business.
Maps work because they provide an understandable, efficient and accurate means of seeing how things fit together. Business process mapping recognizes this undeniable fact and leverages it for increased productivity and efficiency.
Although there are parts of your business that are one-of-a-kind or one-time affairs, most of what you do is a little more predictable. There are processes that you follow to get the results you need.
Those processes may develop organically over time. If you kept driving downtown every night for a few weeks, you might eventually find those tapas in time to get a table. You'd then have a system in place for finding the place again.
However, you could have found your way there much earlier if you started with a map, right? It would've saved a lot of time and you could've avoided a few trips to McDonald's, too.
There's also a strong chance that the route you finally discovered to the restaurant isn't the best one. You may not have figured it out yet, but there could be a faster and more efficient route from your place to the restaurant. Map it out. See what happens. It's never too late.
Let's get back to your business. You have processes in place. Some were developed in chunks based on a combination of luck, skill and experience. You also need to formalize other processes. Right now, you're still struggling to find your way from Point A to Point B.
And that's why it's important to remember that maps are your friends.
Business process mapping involves organizing and breaking down your processes into formalized, easy-to-follow steps. It's a matter of finding repeatable and optimized systems to reduce complication and to increase your ability to handle regular challenges effectively.
When you have those maps, things get done and they get done the right way-every time. You don't get lost and you never arrive at a restaurant two hours after it's closed for the evening.
Are you creating organized systems to accomplish regular events in your business? If you're not, you need to make a point of engaging in some serious business process mapping.