Presentation by dakshinamoorthi g

Mantra for Process Excellence

Dakshinamoorthi GSenior ManagerCognizant Technology Solutions Limited

PROCESS WAY OF LIFE

MANTRA OF PROCESS EXCELLENCE

PMI India National Conference -2014

AbstractMantra for Process Excellence ‘Process- way of Life’- Bring in process culture and make it engrained in

everyday activity. This paper helps to understand how ‘Process – way of Life’ is being implemented in the

organization and how it strengthens the project management by making the processes more predictable

and repeatable. The journey starts with the enablement of people through fun based learning. Success of

Project Management lies in the kind of data being used for managing the project. This will explain you on

how the improvement in process awareness helps to bring the right data into the system. As we focus on

‘Same report for the customer and internal governance’, any issues with the data being used will flow as

the feedback to the system. Process implementation will be successful only when the need of that

reaches to the ground level people. Project Management is no more a job performed by only a group of

people. This will paper will talk about various rewards and recognitions for process evangelists to

motivate them and encourage others to involve in process improvement activities. Identification of best

practices and spreading them across the organization spreads the positive message. The benefits from

this is not only limited to the quantified efforts saved because of repeatable and predictable process but

also results in the following status - Process is not just being followed because of the push/follow up from

the Top management or to satisfy any dashboards but becomes the way of life.

Abstract.......................................................................................................................................................2

Introduction.................................................................................................................................................4

Enablers – Process way of life......................................................................................................................4

Tools:.......................................................................................................................................................5

People and Process:.................................................................................................................................5

Project Management – Not happening in Silos...........................................................................................6

Synergizing Best Practices...........................................................................................................................7

One report for internal governance and Customer.....................................................................................8

Spreading positive vibes............................................................................................................................10

Benefits- Process way of Life.....................................................................................................................11

Conclusion.................................................................................................................................................11

References.................................................................................................................................................12

Introduction

“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore is not an act, but a habit” - Aristotle

‘Process- way of life’ aims at making ‘Adherence to process’ a habit and not something that happens

because of a push.The current generation knows the importance of doing exercise and to stay fit. How

many of us do that as a practice? Similarly, even if the people in an organization know about the

importance of following process, this will not be followed across the organization (by different levels of

people) unless it becomes a habit.

This paper talks about how the ‘Process- way of Life’ is being implemented as a theme in one of the

practices in our Organization. The challenges faced while implementing the themes and how they were

addressed is also explained here. How projects were managed in a better way by strengthened project

management is clearly given in this paper. The methods provided here can be repeated in any of the

organizations to get a similar result. Most of the scenarios have been explained by cartoons on‘before’

and ‘after’ status. Benefits realized out of this theme implementation have also been provided at the end

of this paper.

Enablers – Process way of life

Before

Fig. 1

Success of Project Management lies in the kind of data being used for Project Management. People,

Process and Tools are the three key factors that influence the data flowing to the system.

Tools:Tools play a major role in bringing the right data into the system. If the update in the tool takes away lot of

effort from the project teams, team will not enter the data unless otherwise they are forced to do this.

Time study was conducted to list down the high priority issues in the tools and calls were scheduled with

the tools support team to resolve these issues. Feedback from the users was received and user friendly

features were added. A sense of ownership got developed within the team as their requirements were

taken care of.Suggestions provided by the teams on improving the features, user friendliness and

performance of the tools were rewarded in various forums.

People and Process:Project Management cannot be successful if the process awareness is low among the teams. Can the process awareness be achieved by traditional methods of class room training? We thought differently and we ran it in a different way.

Capsule learning courses and an awareness campaign named ‘eQuipe’ spread the process awareness

and the need of each and every metrics being tracked by the system. Floor walkthrough sessions and

Fun based learning (learning through customized games like bow and arrow, snake and ladder,

playing cards etc.) ensured a good training coverage and an effective communication of the message.

People understood that the reporting of right metrics depends on the data entering into the system.

After

Fig.2

Project Management – Not happening in SilosBefore

Fig.3

Project Management entirely depended on the data flowing from an individual/PMO. They get the

information from the team through various sources and come out with the dashboard or reports which will

help in their Project management activities. As the data is not directly flowing from the team, no

ownership of data is there and this will also impact the integrity of the data flowing into the dashboard and

the reports.

After

Fig. 4

Process, Tool and People enablement helped the direct entry of data into the system. Every team

member logged the effort spent and activity related data in the tool. This has brought in the individual

ownership of data entered by every individual. This has also helped the flow of right data into the system

resulting in right metrics for project management.

Synergizing Best Practices

Before

Fig.5

Lot of best practices on effort saving, defect reduction and automation were happening in many of the

projects. Those project specific initiatives were happening in pockets and reinventing the wheel was

happening in many of the projects. A project facing an issue may not know that the same issue was

handled effectively by another project.

After

Fig.6

Account Level and Practice level best practices sessions were happening and the individuals or project

teams were invited to share the best practices. This motivated the teams to contribute further. Mailers on

best practices were shared across the practice. Individuals and teams were asked to write blogs on the

best practices. Best practices were awarded in common forums like town halls and quarterly connect

meetings.

One report for internal governance and Customer

Before

Fig.7

Different kinds of metrics/dashboards were used at different levels of the organization. Project

management data resided in multiple tools and one has to refer to those tools to do a Project

management review. Project level reviews may not have the same kind of metrics that is being reviewed

at a monthly status meeting or a steering committee meeting by the customer. This is because of various

dependencies like activities pending with customer and third parties, waivers/exemptions applied by PMO

(project management office) team, data quality issues etc. Customer expectation may not be met if

different metrics/dashboards were tracked at different levels.

After

Fig.8

Arriving at the common metrics and tracking the same metrics by the service provider and the customer

provide the view of complete picture to the project teams. Single project management tool was used for

getting the dashboard and project management reports. Having regular reviews of the metrics/dashboard

will help to take immediate actions and help the team to meet the customer expectations. Weekly reviews

happen directly through reviewing the project management tools and not by going through separate

reports. This provides immediate feedback to the system so that the project’s performance is improved.

Spreading positive vibes

Before

Fig.9

List of metrics submission defaulters and process compliance defaulters were published across the

practice. Things were happening by the push from the top management and the process adherence was

somehow maintained.

After

Fig.10

Process champions who lead the team in getting the right data into the system were awarded. Best

managed projects and accounts were selected based on the metrics and they were awarded. ‘Best

practices’ sharing was encouraged by awarding the most reused best practice. This has spread the

positive vibes across the practice and motivated the people to adhere to the process and contributed in

making this a habit.

Our Practice head mentioned a famous quote by Henry Ford during the awards function and that was apt

for that occasion.

“Quality means doing it RIGHT when No one is looking.”

Benefits- Process way of Life

‘Process-way of life’ helped to bring the right data into the system and this helped the project

management to make a repeatable and predictable process.

Reviewing the right metrics from right data helped the teams to take appropriate actions to

improve their current levels

One of the projects has achieved a backlog of 4 tickets /week from 70tickets/week because of

the weekly review of right data into the system and taking corrective actions appropriately. Similar

benefits were visualized in other projects as well

Improvement in other key metrics like onsite/offshore resolution rate and ticket productivity is also

evidenced in the projects

Best practices sharing motivated the teams to bring in more number of small improvement

programs resulting in huge dollar benefits

Effort and Metrics submission are happening without any reminders or push from the

Management

Practice is a consistent top performer in the Organization Dashboard on Delivery and Maturity

Parameters

Conclusion

By implementing ‘Process- way of life’, every single person in the organization, from the top management

to developers, not only understands the process, but implements and uses it on a daily basis. Positive

vibes spread across the organization bring in improvements in various metrics reported to the

customer.The implementation done in one of the practices is now being shared with other parts of the

organization to bring in this culture across the organization. This can be implemented in any type of

organization.

References

Not applicable