Evaluating Digitalization Potential: A Practical Guide

Processes, Measures, Roadmap: An Overview of the Approach

In our example, we focus on processes as the object of investigation. Instead of processes, we could also examine workplaces, individual work steps, or at a higher level, workflows and information exchange between departments, locations, or companies.

For the remainder of this article, we'll consider a complex work process with customer interaction and explore the following five phases:

1. Identify and analyze processes
2. Evaluate processes
3. Identify measures
4. Evaluate measures
5. Prioritization and roadmap

We'll structure the following sections according to these five phases and explore each phase in detail.

Phase 1: Identify and Analyze Processes

Using a top-down approach, we document the work process and detail it to a level that allows for evaluation of processes and process steps, as well as the derivation of measures.

This might look as follows:

• Prepare proposal
  • Gather information
    • from email
    • from meeting notes
    • from SharePoint
  • Structure project
  • Write proposal
    • Open template in proposal software
    • Write content
  • Feedback round
    • Send draft proposal to colleagues via email
    • Colleague documents feedback via email
    • Evaluate feedback
    • Adjust proposal
  • Send proposal
    • Download PDF
    • Open email and write message
    • Attach PDF
    • Send
• Customer provides feedback on proposal
  • ...
• Make adjustments
  • ...

Phase 2: Evaluate Processes

In the next step, each process is evaluated. The evaluation criteria can be freely chosen and supplemented with optimization targets such as financial metrics. Attributes also help to analyze larger numbers of elements later.

The processes and their evaluation can be represented on a process map to make the information tangible and develop a better understanding.

Based on the evaluation, processes can be clustered according to different dimensions.

Possible fields and attributes for the elements:

• Pain (1-5): How problematic is the current process?
• Complexity (1-5): How many steps and dependencies are there?
• Degree of automation (1-5): How manual is the process currently?
• Overall Impact
  • Impact on economic efficiency (1-5): What influence does the process have on costs?
  • Impact on customer experience (1-5): How strongly does the process influence customer satisfaction?
• Leading system: Which software is primarily used?
• Connected processes: Which other processes are related to this one?

Phase 3: Identify Measures

For each object under investigation, in our case processes, we develop one or more measures aimed at improving or digitalizing the process. Individual processes could be accelerated through machine processing in a simple variant, or in a more complex variant be fully automated or even eliminated.

Phase 4: Evaluate Measures

Each measure can involve different levels of time and resource commitment. The criteria by which we evaluate the measures again depend on the optimization goal, the type of measures, or industry-specific conditions.

There are numerous factors that can be considered and form the basis for later decision-making. The following is an exemplary list:

• Overall evaluation of effort (1-5)
  • Costs: How high are the direct costs for implementation?
  • Internal effort: Which resources are tied up internally?
• Overall evaluation of benefit (1-5)
  • Pain after change (1-5): How problematic will the process remain after the change?
  • Degree of automation after change (1-5): How automated will the process be?
  • Improvement in economic efficiency (1-5): How significantly will cost efficiency improve?
  • Improvement in customer experience (1-5): How significantly will the customer experience improve?

Phase 5: Prioritization and Roadmap

The result is a structured package of processes and associated measures that can be prioritized and planned on a roadmap. The measures and processes can be visualized to help gain a different understanding.

Before roadmap planning can take place, processes and measures are clustered, from which prioritization can be derived.

Possible prioritization options:

• Prioritization of quick wins
• Measures that alleviate the greatest pain first
• Measures that have the greatest impact on customer experience first

Once we have clustered and prioritized our processes and measures, we can schedule them on a roadmap and coordinate them with other initiatives within the company.

The Result

By this point, you've now taken several hours or even days, depending on the number and scope of what you've examined. What results can you expect?

• Processes identified, analyzed, evaluated, and clustered:

  Clarity about the pain and impact of each process.

• Measures identified, evaluated, and clustered:

  Clarity about the effort and benefit of each measure.

• Prioritization and roadmap created:

  Clarity about the effort for initial measures and further steps.

What's Next?

By now, it should be clear how and with what you should best start and how to proceed from there. Certainly, not every detail is clarified yet or all cost estimates final, but you can get started. The decision-making foundation is in place, and parallel to starting your measures, the analyses and evaluations can be detailed and finalized.

Is your project somewhat larger or the domain complex and diverse? Would you like to have an experienced and implementation-strong partner from the beginning? Then feel free to contact us, and together we'll find the way forward for you!!