Is Your Process Mapping Hiding the Truth?

John Dyer describes process mapping as one of the most powerful tools for process improvement when it tells the truth.

Unfortunately, it too often doesn’t tell the truth, say Dyer and Dr. Mohamed Saleh, hosts of Behind the Curtain: Adventures in Continuous Improvement. Instead of showcasing reality, or how the process actually works, what emerges from many mapping sessions is an idealized version of the process, one in which the ugly realities of the process—unofficial steps, bottleneck operations, waiting on parts, for example—are hidden or magically disappear.

That’s not good. “You can't improve until you admit that you need to improve, and the only way to show that you need to improve is to, what I call ‘process map ugly,’ really focus on identifying those hidden, ugly steps,” Dyer says.

In this podcast episode Dyer and Saleh dive into the challenges of process mapping, outlining the many forces that discourage truth-telling in process mapping and providing suggestions about how to make process mapping more meaningful.

See also: Visualizing Workflows—Navigating Value Stream Mapping vs Process Mapping

What are some of those forces that discourage process-mapping teams from exposing uncomfortable truths? Ego and reputation management are two, Saleh says. Then there is the broad umbrella of fear: fear of being blamed for a less than pristine process, fear of being laid off or otherwise reprimanded, fear of appearing incompetent.

“Aren't we realizing more and more that ‘drive out fear’ is the foundation of all of this,” Dyer notes.

Leaders also contribute to the problem, perhaps accidentally, Saleh says. While they will claim to want honesty, they reward perfection.

“So many leaders ask for transparency while unconsciously punishing exposure, so you'll never get a real map,” Saleh says.

On the other hand, some leaders may believe a pristine process map reflects reality, particularly if they never do gemba walks, talk to people close to the process or experience the process themselves, Dyer says.

“They may be sitting in their ivory tower thinking, ‘Oh, everything is great. We don't have hidden steps,’” he says.

The duo discusses several solutions to help improve process mapping. It begins with culture.

“You have to create an environment or culture that embraces this, to say, ‘Hey, we want the ugliest map, we want to expose this, not to point fingers, not to point blame, but actually to highlight the challenges that you are going through, so that we can do something about it, that we can actually fix the process,’” Dyer says.

He also encourages diversity within the process-mapping team by bringing in suppliers, internal or external customers, and at least one person who has never done the process before and brings a fresh set of eyes.

Adds Saleh: Don’t rush the map, don’t sanitize the findings and “create safety first, so exposure does not equal punishment.”