What's Up With PIM?

By Valinda Rose

You may be wondering by now, “What is happening with the PIM process?” You remember the one; it’s the process to manage processes, aka Process Improvement Management! We want you to know that it is alive and well, in its “Preliminary Design” state. As you drill down into the process you’ll see we are currently in the “Simulate the Process” step, using Incident Management as our pilot. 

Let’s take a walk together through the steps the Process Navigators have taken thus far, in conjunction with OIT Leadership Council and others, and then give you a sneak peak of what is yet to come. 

Please refer to the newsletter insert for an overview of the PIM process. One side shows a textual one-page summary of key process components in PIM and the other side is a high- or overview-level map of PIM. 

Here is an outline of what has been accomplished so far: 

1.0 Evaluate the Process

• Step 1.1 Initiate a Process Innovation Effort – OIT Leadership Council was approached with a proposal to formalize the PIM process as a means of implementing the “customer-centric, supported by process” strategy that Kelly and Kelly introduced at February’s OIT All-Hands Meeting. 
  
• Step 1.2 Establish Organizational Sponsorship – OIT Leadership Council selected and chartered a cross-functional team (now known as the Process Navigators) to develop and implement PIM throughout OIT.
  
• Step 1.3 Gather Process Documentation – Process Navigators collected and gleaned from process-based activities that had been previously done in OIT as well as drawing from proven practices in the industry. This provided a view of the current process and ideas for the vision and scope for the Process Improvement Management effort.
  
• Step 1.4 Select Areas of Focus and Step 1.5 Determine Strategic Priority – OIT Leadership Council granted priority support to members of the Navigation team to allow focus on this important effort. The area of focus is to establish the baseline PIM process, design and validate an improved process, and implement the process in OIT. 
  

2.0 Analyze the Process

• Step 2.1 Plan Analysis Phase – A simple project plan was created that outlined the activities that needed to be accomplished in order to analyze the current process. This step included activities such as training the team on process improvement, establishing a communication plan, and validating the project plan.
  
• Step 2.2 Analyze Current Process – In this step, we took a more detailed look at best practices and current practices and identified gaps.
  
• Step 2.3 Select Improvement Opportunities – The Process Navigators outlined the gaps that needed to be focused on in order for the process to best meet the needs of OIT.
  
• Step 2.4 Obtain Confirmation and Support (Return and Report) – We briefed OIT Leadership Council on what we were doing and obtained their feedback and support for continuing the process improvement exercise. 
  

3.0 Develop the Process

• Step 3.1 Plan the Design Phase - Process Navigators outlined next steps and set target dates for the preliminary process design to be accomplished. 
  
• Step 3.2 Create the Preliminary Process Design – Process Navigators developed a set of templates based on best practices, and then documented the target PIM process using these formal templates. This resulted in the Process Package, introduced in last month’s newsletter. The Process Package for PIM is based on the reconciliation of industry proven practices and OIT’s strategic direction. It consists of the following documents: Process Policy, Process Overview, Process Map, Detail Process Steps, Roles and Responsibilities, and Continuous Improvement Plan. 
  
• Step 3.3 Simulate the Process – The purpose of this step is to walk through the process and validate that the process design fills the gaps and meets the organizational requirements. OIT Leadership Council approved Incident Management as the first process to pilot through PIM. This is indicated on OIT’s Process Roadmap. A formal project request was approved in PMC (Portfolio Management Council) to run through the PIM process for Incident Management. 
  

The project objective for the “PIM Incident Management Process Improvement” project is: Evaluate, analyze, develop, and implement a formal incident management process as a PIM pilot by December 31, 2008.

So, as for PIM, that’s where we stand. Stay tuned for more reports in the coming months about how the effort is progressing. Just remember, this will affect you! Please feel free to address any questions to the Process Navigation Team or to your line management. Managing Directors “are in the know” and are also able to address any concerns you might have.