A rubric is provided below A. Page 1 (3 points – 1 point for ea.docx

A rubric is provided below:
A. Page 1 (3 points – 1 point for each bullet)
Full title of the article, your name, department and university,
course number and name,
professor’s name, and due date of assignment
Properly formatted page number
Hard copy of article attached (minus 10 points without article or
if article was published
more than 6 years ago)
B. Pages 3-4 Full title of the article (titles 1 – 5 are all level
one headings)
1. The Problem (5 points – 1 point for each bullet)
Is the problem clearly stated?
Is the problem practically important?
What is the purpose of the study?
What is the hypothesis?
Are the key terms defined?
2. Review of Literature (5 points – 1 point for each bullet)
Are the cited sources pertinent to the study?
Is the review too broad or too narrow?
Are the references recent?
Are the references thorough enough for the topic of the paper?
What possible evidence of bias exists?
3. Design and procedures (5 points – 1 point for each bullet)
What research design was used (survey, observation,
experiment)?
Was it a pilot, replica study, or an original study?
What measurement tools were used? What statistical formulas
were employed?
How were the procedures structured?
What are the variables? How was sampling conducted?
4. Data Analysis and presentation (8 points – 2 points for each
bullet)

How were data analyzed?
Were data qualitative or quantitative?
Did findings support the hypothesis and purpose?
Were weaknesses and problems discussed?
5. Conclusions and Implications (5 points – 1 point for each
bullet)
Are the conclusions of the study related to the original purpose?
Address the credibility of the authors or principal investigators.
Were the implications discussed? Whom will the results and
conclusions affect?
What recommendations were made at the conclusion?
6. Overall Assessment (5 points – holistic assessment)
What is your overall assessment of the study’s value and
significance?
What did you learn?
C. Page 5 Reference Article citation in APA 7th Ed. Format (0
errors: 4 pts, 1+ errors: 0 pts)
D. Overall APA 7th Edition Format (4-5 errors: 2 pts, 1-3
errors: 3 pts, 0 errors: 5pts)
© Strayer University. All Rights Reserved. This document
contains Strayer University Confidential and Proprietary
information and may not
be copied, further distributed, or otherwise disclosed in whole
or in part, without the expressed written permission of Strayer
University.
JWI 550 (1208) Page 1 of 14
JWI 550: Operational Excellence

Week Three Lecture Notes
University.
JWI 550 (1208) Page 2 of 14
HOW WORK GETS DONE
What It Means
In operations, the term process refers to how work flows from a
specific input to a specific output. Process
mapping, like value stream mapping, utilizes diagramming
techniques to support three objectives that are
part of any pursuit of operational excellence: (1) defining the
beginnings and ends of the processes for
which you and your team are responsible, (2) clarifying all the
steps that take place between the starts
and ends of those processes, and (3) identifying opportunities to
improve processes within the value
stream.
Why It Matters

• You and your team need to define exactly what you are
responsible for delivering and at what
stage each deliverable gets handed off to the next team.
• It forces you to document and validate exactly what is
currently happening in each process and
not make assumptions about specific tasks in the work flow.
• It provides a clear visual tool to begin exploring individual
discrete processes to test for
weaknesses, and it is the basis from which you will establish
baseline metrics to gauge future
improvements.
“Assume you get a new job, whether it is in
sales or manufacturing or anywhere, the
best thing you can do for yourself is to get a
good handle on how what you are
responsible for works...and the best way to
do that is to process map.”
Jack Welch

University.
JWI 550 (1208) Page 3 of 14
THE CHALLENGE AND OPPORTUNITY FOR MANAGERS
Our course is designed to balance two types of analysis that are
critical in the pursuit of operational
excellence:
1. The big-picture, customer-centric view developed through
value stream mapping
2. The tools of operations management that can be applied to
improve specific processes
Operational leaders must be able to leverage both while not
compromising either.
As discussed last week, it is not expected that management
understand the minutiae of each process in a
value stream. Still, they must apply their operational and
leadership talents to involve the right people in
the analysis. They must use the tools of OM to get far enough
“into the weeds” to uncover barriers to
performance. This requires the input of front-line workers who
have detailed knowledge about how the
work really gets done and who are excited about an improved
future state – the topic of our readings for
next week.

Great operators must be both big-picture thinkers and detail-
oriented analysts. They must be able to step
back and consider the mission of the organization and how it
delivers value to customers in ways that
create a sustainable competitive advantage. And they must be
able to dive deep and figure out what’s
really going on.
This balance is not always easy to sustain, but it is necessary. If
there is too much focus on the big
picture, the root causes of dysfunction may never come to light.
If there is too much focus on process
details, you risk putting lots of time and energy into individual
tasks that have little impact on the
organization’s overall performance and competitive advantage.
University.
JWI 550 (1208) Page 4 of 14
YOUR STARTING POINT

1. Do you know exactly where your team’s responsibilities
begin and where they end? In other
words, do you know the exact point at which the input is
received and ready to be worked on,
and where the final output is handed off to another team?
2. How well do you understand each and every step in the
current processes being used?
3. Do you know the difference between a step in a process
where a value is added and a step
where work is held and no value is added?
4. Do you understand not only how work flows from one step to
the next, but where projects and
products encounter capacity issues that result in bottlenecks that

slow down everything?
5. If you were to ask the people performing the tasks in a
process what currently works well and
what doesn’t, what would you expect to hear?
6. Do you have any knowledge about how the processes your
organization uses to produce an
output compare to those used by your competitors?
University.
JWI 550 (1208) Page 5 of 14
HOW WORK REALLY GETS DONE

We have mentioned the term process several times. Now, we are
ready to dig deeper into what we mean
by that term and how we can evaluate whether discrete
processes are performing well or not.
From Input to Output
Every organization has processes to get work done. Through
these processes, inputs (e.g., a partially
finished product or service) are transformed into outputs (e.g., a
more finished product or service, or one
that is housed in a location more accessible to the consumer)
that add value. But to understand exactly
how this happens, and to document it for others’ use,
organizations must map out what their work teams
are doing and how they do it.
Process mapping does not just document an organization’s
product strategy and processes. It also
facilitates both analysis of the processes to identify areas of
improvement and measurement of the
organization’s success in achieving its goals. This is critical
information. Without it, it is much more difficult
to identify the best opportunities for improvement. You cannot
accurately judge how to scale your success
or fix the problem unless you understand what you are already
doing. You cannot evaluate how well the
organization is operating unless you have some way to measure
the results it produces. This requires
process mapping and process metrics.
WHAT IS A PROCESS?

Before we go any further, let’s define the term:
“A process is a set of tasks to be performed in a defined
sequence and uses inputs (such as
labor, capital, knowledge, raw materials, purchased
components, and energy) to create outputs
that are of great value to customers and therefore to the
organization itself. While it may be easier
for many of us to visualize an automobile assembly process or a
steel-making process, every
organization – manufacturing or service, public or private, for-
profit or not-for-profit – organizes its
work through its operating processes.”
“Process Analysis,” p. 3
Regardless of sector, every organization’s operating processes
are meant to fulfill two goals:
1. Deliver the “customer promise”
2. Create value for stakeholders
As Shapiro notes, “Organizations without the means to improve
rarely can keep up with competition, and
improvement requires a deep understanding of underlying
operating processes and an ability to assess
their performance” (p. 4). And so, we have two questions to
answer:
1. How is each particular process doing?
2. How might we do it better?

University.
JWI 550 (1208) Page 6 of 14
The first question is the focus of this week’s reading, and the
second question will be our focus next
week.
While a process is a more granular and internally focused
segment of the work flow than a value stream,
mapping processes and mapping value streams have a similar
purpose.
“Process flow diagrams are useful in many different ways. One
use… is as a communications tool
that allows a team of people to share a common view of the
work they are performing. When a
team has such a shared view of what activities (tasks) are being
performed and in what
sequence, as well as how products and information flow, they
can more easily discuss the pros
and the cons of changes and improvements to the process.”

TYPES OF PROCESS MAPS
As mentioned earlier, a process takes an input and transforms it
through an action into an output. When a
sawmill transforms a log into a stack of two-by-fours, the log is
the input and the two-by-fours are the
output. The sawing, planning, and other actions employed by
the sawmill personnel to produce the two-
by-fours are the process.
One way to understand the process is to create a graphic
representation of what happens between input
and output. This graphic depiction is called a process map. A
process map shows the logical flow or
sequence of steps and activities that an item undergoes when it
is transformed by the process from an
input to an output. The four most common types of maps are:
• Value stream map (VSM)
• High-level process map and SIPOC
• Swim lane process map (also called deployment or cross-
functional maps)
• Detailed (low-level) process map
1. VALUE STREAM MAP (VSM)
As a reminder from our previous readings, a value stream map

is a diagram depicting all the actions
required to bring a product from concept to launch, and from
order to delivery. This includes processing
the customer’s information, transforming inputs to produce the
product, and delivering the final product to
the consumer. The map captures all the key flows of work,
information, and materials in a process. A
value stream map also includes important process metrics, such
as setup times, processing times, units
in queue, wait times, and total lead time. Value stream maps are
widely used in “lean” projects, which
emphasize carrying as little inventory as possible, to map the
order to delivery cycle.
University.
JWI 550 (1208) Page 7 of 14
2. HIGH-LEVEL PROCESS MAP
A high-level process map provides an overview of the process

that captures the main inputs and outputs
of the process, but which may leave out small details in an
effort to represent the process overall. A high-
level process map typically represents the process in 4 to 9
process steps.
For example:
• A manufacturing plant’s process may be represented on a
high-level process map as raw materials
storage progressing to processing of a finished product, to
storage of the finished product, and
finally to shipment of the product to the customer.
• A distribution center can be mapped out as materials coming
into the distribution center, staged in
a storage location, picked and packaged to fulfill the customer
order, shipped to the customer, and
invoiced.
• A medical office could map out the flow of their operations,
including the reception area, patient
rooms, and medical storage, and could also include billing and
clerical functions.
SIPOC
SIPOC is a popular tool used to provide a high-level overview
of the process. This includes the elements
of the acronym — the suppliers, inputs, process, outputs, and
customers. A SIPOC diagram shows the
process steps at a high level in one column, while other columns
list:

• The suppliers and the inputs they provide to the process
• The outputs and customers who receive the outputs of the
process
When mapping a process, it’s helpful to first map the high-
level, major steps in the process. From there,
we can “decompose” the key steps into lower-level, detailed
process maps. The process of completing
this breakdown is called process decomposition. We start with
an overview (the “forest”) and then drill
down (to the “trees”). You need to define the overview first so
you don’t lose sight of the process’s overall
flow.
3. SWIM LANE PROCESS MAP (DEPLOYMENT OR CROSS
FUNCTIONAL MAPS)
A swim lane process map, also called a deployment or cross-
functional map, is similar to a detailed
process map. The difference is that in a swim lane map, the
depiction of the process steps is overlaid with
“swim lanes” representing the departments, functions, or teams
responsible for each of the process steps.
The advantage of using a swim lane process map is that it
shows, not just who performs a given step in
the process, but also the hand-offs among departments. Hand-
offs among departments are possible
points of process failure where errors or miscommunications
can result in the process not working as it is
supposed to.

University.
JWI 550 (1208) Page 8 of 14
Swim lane process maps would be applicable in situations such
as the following:
• In a problem resolution process, an operator may identify a
problem and communicate this to a
supervisor. The supervisor works with the maintenance
department to solve the problem, while
maintenance personnel may work with engineering personnel to
design the fix. Engineering may in
turn work with outside vendors and purchasers to buy and
install a solution. Production planning
may also be involved to schedule downtime at the facility in
order to halt the process and install the
solution.
• The process of purchasing and financing a loan is also a good
example. This starts with selection
of the home and continues through contract negotiation, loan

origination, inspection, loan closing,
and transfer of ownership. Each of these steps requires the
interaction of the buyer, agent, seller,
bank, home inspector, attorney, and movers, all of whom
perform different functions independently
and relative to each other.
4. DETAILED (LOW-LEVEL) PROCESS MAPS
A detailed or low-level process map is essentially the detail of
each of the individual steps of the process
or processes depicted in the high-level process map. Detailed
process maps show the linkages,
decisions, inspections, feedback, and rework loops of the
process. They explain the “if this, then that”
types of decisions that take place for the process to transform
its inputs into outputs.
The detail provided by a low-level process map allows you to
analyze the map and identify opportunities
for improvement. You can use a detailed, “as-is” map of an
actual process to identify, study, document,
and analyze delays, points of failure, rework, and bottlenecks in
the process (points where the process is
too slow or inefficient). A detailed process map could range
from 10 to 30 or more steps.
Some examples include...
• The receiving of raw materials, storage of those raw materials,
and the retrieval of raw materials to
be used in processing

• The pass, fail, rework, and retest feedback loops of a product
testing process
• The script flow used by a customer service agent in a call
center, who reads through various
“if this, then that” queries and responses in handling customer
calls
University.
JWI 550 (1208) Page 9 of 14
PROCESS METRICS AND RELATED TERMINOLOGY
Some important process metrics and related terminology are
capacity, utilization, efficiency, bottlenecks,
processing rates, and throughput time. The first step in
measuring process performance is measuring
task times (p. 7):
“The standard time of a task is defined as the average time that
an employee (or customer in
many service processes) with average skills will take to

complete that task, under ordinary
circumstances, and working at a sustainable pace.
“One important measure of any process is labor content, the
total time that is spent by the firm’s
employees on the product or service. Labor cost is, of course,
greater than labor content
multiplied by the wage rate, because the firm needs to pay
employees for any idle time that they
incur because of imbalances in the process structure.”
“Process Analysis,” pp. 7-8
These considerations require that we expand our notion of task
times. A task in a batch process, or in any
process, may require the following:
1. Setup time, the amount of time required to get ready for the
task (to load the riders on a Disney
World ride, for example, or to prepare the settings on the
machine that mixes the dumpling filling)
and, if necessary, clean up afterward. Formally, setup time is
any time taken to perform a task
that is independent of the number of products or customers
being processed.
2. Run time, the time it takes to process each unit. Formally,
run time is the time taken to perform a
task that varies with the number of products or customers being
processed.

Bottleneck
This term refers to the limiting factor or constraint in the
system, the point at which the process takes the
longest time to complete a step compared to other steps.
Identifying bottlenecks and determining how to
address them is one way to make the process more efficient.
“[T]he bottleneck of any process is the task that causes all other
tasks to have idle time (there
may be two or more bottlenecks in any process). In other words,
a bottleneck constrains product
flow.”
“Capacity and bottleneck analysis are important because
capacity limits output and output (as
well as price) determines revenue, but neither capacity nor
bottleneck analysis tells us much
about other key measures of process performance. In particular,
most operations managers are
quite concerned with the efficiency of their processes—the cost
of the inputs, and, often as
important, how well these processes make use of those inputs.”

University.
JWI 550 (1208) Page 10 of 14
Capacity
This term refers to the maximum rate of output for a process,
measured in units of output per unit of time.
Capacity is not “load” (the actual rate of output) and should not
be stated as “maximum capacity” because
that would be redundant. Capacity is itself the maximum
possible output.
“Formally, we have defined capacity as the maximum output, in
terms of units produced or
customers served, in a specified time period (e.g., units
manufactured per hour or customers
served per day). This is a critical measure of process
performance because it constrains revenue.
You can’t sell more than you can make—a firm’s maximum
revenue is limited by its capacity.”
“Clearly, making a process more efficient means decreasing idle
times as much as possible. This
requires redefining tasks, wherever possible, to balance the

process—that is, to make cycle times
as nearly equal as possible and capacity utilization at each task
as high as possible. However,
because many tasks are not easily divisible it is rarely possible
to balance a process fully.”
There are two types of capacity. The first is design capacity, the
theoretical maximum output of a system
in a given period under ideal conditions. Design capacity may
be greater than actual capacity because
“ideal conditions” are rarely encountered in real life. The
second is effective capacity, the capacity a firm
can expect to achieve, given its product mix, scheduling,
maintenance, and quality.
Cycle Times
“The system’s cycle time is the average time between the
completion of successive units of product or, in
the case of a service process, the average time between the
departures of successive customers” (p.11).
Efficiency and Effectiveness
“[P]rocess performance is a matter of efficiency (how well a
process turns its inputs into outputs), and
effectiveness (how well a process delivers its customer
promise)” (pp. 15-16).

Flexibility
This term refers to “the ability to change or react with little
penalty in time, effort, cost or performance” (p.
20).
University.
JWI 550 (1208) Page 11 of 14
Labor Utilization
“[W]e define labor utilization as useful time (namely, time
actually working on a product or
delivering a service) spent by workers as a percentage of the
total time for which they are
available (and being paid).”
“We need to be careful as to how we use the labor utilization
calculation to make decisions. Some
managers, thinking that efficiency is reflected in ‘workers being
busy,’ exhort their workers to
increase their utilization by making more product. However, at

non-bottleneck steps, greater labor
utilization translates into more inventory, not more saleable
product. Rather than increasing labor
utilization itself, emphasis should be placed on breaking
bottlenecks. Reducing a bottleneck’s
time will automatically raise labor utilization, but in a useful
way, namely one that results in more
saleable product and increased revenues.”
“Process Analysis,” pp. 16, 17
Processing Rate
The processing rate of a step in the process is the rate at which
units come off that specific step or
workstation (for example, 2 units/minute). The process or cycle
time of the workstation is the time
between units coming off that workstation (in our example, 30
seconds/unit). For example, if the cashier
at a grocery store takes an average of 6 minutes to check out a
customer, the process (or cycle) time at
the checkout station is 6 minutes. If there are 3 cashiers
working, then the checkout station (combined)
can complete checking out 3 customers every 6 minutes. The
checkout process functions at the
processing rate of 3 customers every 6 minutes, or 0.5
customers per minute. The process or cycle time
is the reciprocal of the processing rate. In this example, the
process or cycle time at the checkout station
is 6/3 or 2 minutes.
Quality
“Quality is the ability of a product or service to meet or exceed

customers’ expectations… We
define quality in two different ways:
• Performance quality
• Conformance quality”
“Process Analysis,” pp. 17-18
“A firm that competes on performance quality produces goods
and services that deliver a high
level of some set of performance dimensions… In contrast, a
product or service with high
conformance quality delivers on its specifications, whether that
means a high level of
performance or not.”
University.
JWI 550 (1208) Page 12 of 14
“Performance quality is primarily the realm of designers and
product developers. Operations is

responsible for developing processes that meet design
specifications. A product that does not
meet its design specifications is typically called a defect.”
Speed
“A second aspect of effectiveness that is important to many
firms is how quickly (and reliably)
they can produce and deliver a product to customers, or, in a
service context, how quickly a
customer can be served.”
Throughput Time
Throughput time is the time it takes for a product to go through
the production process with no waiting. It
is the longest path through the system.
“We define throughput time (TPT) as the start-to-finish time of
a process, namely the total
elapsed time between the time when a customer walks in the
door and the time when the
customer leaves, or the time from when the raw materials and
components begin to be gathered
and the time the finished product is completed.”

Utilization
Utilization refers to the actual output as a percent of design
capacity.
University.
JWI 550 (1208) Page 13 of 14
SUCCEEDING BEYOND THE COURSE
As you read the materials and participate in class activities, stay
focused on the key learning outcomes
for the week and how they can be applied to your job.
• Understand the importance of process analysis in any
organization
As the saying goes, “The devil is in the details.” Even the
simplest of businesses has dozens, if
not hundreds, of processes that are part of its regular

operations. Weaknesses in any one of
these can have a cascading effect that undermines the
performance of upstream or downstream
processes. Just as you did with mapping a value stream, select
one particular process that you
and your team are regularly responsible for, and develop a
detailed diagram of the exact steps in
that process needed to transform an input to an output. Clearly
identify the hand-off from task to
task, including those stages where the work is sitting idle,
waiting for additional input(s), or can’t
be moved on because of capacity limitations at the next step.
• Calculate process metrics to explain operational outcomes
After you have created your process map, perform at least 3
calculations for operational
outcomes. To get started, you should calculate the throughput
time, the time spent idle where no
work is being done and no value is being added, and the labor
utilization. You may select
additional or other metrics, of course. The purpose is to gain
experience applying specific
performance metrics to the process. Effective operators “work
by the numbers.” They don’t
speak in generalities or say, “We decreased throughput time by
quite a bit,” or, “We want to
increase capacity by a lot.”
• Analyze a process for improvement opportunities
Take your process map, along with your calculations, and start
asking questions within your

team. Be careful that the questions don’t turn into accusations.
As soon as that happens, you’ll
find that team members get defensive. Framing your questions
around the team’s frustrations is
typically a good approach. It shows that you care about creating
a positive work environment
where mistakes, holdups, and redundant work are minimized so
that everyone benefits. Done
well, this exchange of ideas provides an opportunity for team
members to vent. If there were no
frustrations, there is likely to be little urgency about finding a
better way. But make sure you
channel that frustration into a conversation about solutions. A
sympathetic ear can go a long way
to transforming a frustrated worker into an eager partner in
driving positive change. Demonstrate
through your actions that their input is valued.
University.
JWI 550 (1208) Page 14 of 14
ACTION PLAN
To apply what I have learned this week in my course to my job,
I will…

Action Item(s)
Resources and Tools Needed (from this course and in my
workplace)
Timeline and Milestones
Success Metrics

A rubric is provided below A. Page 1 (3 points – 1 point for ea.docx

A rubric is provided below A. Page 1 (3 points – 1 point for ea.docx

More Related Content

Similar to A rubric is provided below A. Page 1 (3 points – 1 point for ea.docx (20)

More from standfordabbot (20)

Recently uploaded (20)

A rubric is provided below A. Page 1 (3 points – 1 point for ea.docx