Simple truths, episode N: Process is dead

Process is dead. When it comes to process everything has been said. Starting from theory of constraints, through Value Mapping, kanban, complexity theories, lead time & cycle time optimisations, dependency management, to the magic of incremental approach based on short iterations, incremental approach to delivery and product creation, goal and result oriented approaches, scaling, continuous improvement and operational excellence. 

In case of IT projects this knowledge shortened the software delivery live cycle from 3 years in 1980s to 1sec 2010s. 

Nowadays there exist multiple ready to use process governance frameworks that present enormous value and quality: Scrum, Kanban, SAFe, Nexus, Less, to name a few. They really do a great job.

What is more: everything can be done when it comes to process. Nobody has reached the process optimization end though. Not because it is impossible to optimize further - the options here are endless. Nobody has reached the process optimization end because on the way down this route companies discover issues on their way to their effectiveness that with time destroy the energy of the process improvement effort. Due to the attribution error, the issues are attributed to the process / framework itself and the framework gets blamed and accused that "it does not work for us". 

Yet the true reasons of not reaching expected effectiveness improvements lay somewhere else. The expected effectiveness boost is not reached because process is only one of a few elements of an effective company. It is usually the one that is explored as first. And it is usually the last one... Most companies begins and ends within the process optimization aspect. And if they try again, they try in the wrong way - they try to apply another process governance framework...

Given the above vicious cycle it comes as no surprise that the process area is the area of the biggest buzz and the best money for consultants, majority of which never needed to look and explore beyond the process frameworks. These guys will not make your organization effective in the long term. They are capable of setting up a delivery machine, but that is it. Where is human in this machine? This question remains unasked and unanswered.

Few companies and few leaders think wider. I guess you do if you are reading this. 

Process is the easiest piece of the organizational effectiveness puzzle for us humans. It is logical and tangible - natural food for our neocortex brain.

What needs to follow in parallel to implementing an effective process are the areas of 

• organizational culture - how we get things done here, 
• organizational design and architecture - how an organization supports flow of value, and
• leadership style - what mindset and behaviours leaders promote. 

These areas add ocean-deep and ocean-wide potential into the big picture. One can cross the barriers of the machine metaphor as the work in these areas is with people and for people. 

All four dimensions are complementary and all are equally important. They are also closely related - one cannot grow and reach higher levels of maturity without others growing in parallel. It was Michael Spayd who I learnt from the special name for this phenomenon - the idea of all four dimensions tetra-arising.

p.s. Thanks Maciej Rusinek for triggering me to articulate my thoughts!

Photo by Jonathan Borba on Unsplash