Unstructured processes are everywhere in business. They are the ad-hoc, human processes that make the business run that consist of gathering information, collaborating and negotiating with others, and making decisions-fundamentally human activities.
From an IT perspective, most of these processes are run using e-mail and documents which allows the work to get done, but relying only on e-mail and documents has fundamental drawbacks--e-mail overload, a lack of visibility and a lack of control and accountability. These processes are not just in the periphery of the business, but run the gamut from strategic planning to compliance tracking to audits.
Even companies with a process focus tend to ignore unstructured processes and instead focus their IT efforts on the larger, structured processes--such as customer relationship management (CRM), enterprise resource planning (ERP) and business process management (BPM).
Focusing IT effort and investment on structured processes is not bad, but it may be missing the point. Analysts estimate that 60 to 80 percent of the processes that make a business run happen under the radar and are managed via documents and e-mail.
Ignoring these unstructured processes is expensive. For example, an overlooked e-mail causing a missed government regulation deadline that leads to fines and sanctions; an inefficient investigation of a customer fraud report causing unneeded additional expense and an unhappy customer; incomplete incident and accident management which stymies institutional learning and doesn't prevent incident recurrence; disorganized cross organizational projects that cause missed deadlines and lost revenues; and mishandled communication causes crucial parts to be delivered to the wrong facility.
All of these examples are caused by mismanaged unstructured processes. Of course, before you do anything about them you need to know they exist. So how do you discover your unstructured processes?
- Regulatory and Compliance processes--People-intensive processes that are kicked off as a result of an external regulatory body. These processes tend to be ad-hoc and changing, but since they entail some type of penalty if not followed, they require the ability to be tracked and monitored. Health, Safety and Environment (HSE) processes are examples of unstructured processes that fall into this category.
- Exceptions and Escalation processes--People-intensive processes resulting from the need to handle an exception to an existing structured process, or an escalation needed to solve an issue outside the scope of the normal systems. They tend to involve a wide variety of different people, depending on the exact nature of the problem. For example, fraud escalation is kicked off by the normal fraud detection systems and requires that more human investigation be done to resolve the issue. One interesting side effect of these unstructured processes is that they can be used "early warning systems" of changes in the business and customer environment.
- Decision Implementation processes--Once decisions have been taken, they should kick off a set of processes to implement those decisions. How many times has your company made decisions that dissipate and never get implemented since there was no way to track and monitor the progress made? An example is the minutes of a board of directors meeting--the executable decisions kick off a set of unstructured processes to implement those decisions.
- Audit processes--Internal audits of different organizational activities and adherence to guidelines where negotiation is involved before findings are published. Tracking and monitoring these negotiations can ensure that the audit process stays on track and on target. Once the findings are accepted and published, there is the need to track the processes that were kicked off to address the findings.
- Complex Project Management processes--Managing a project is all about managing and coordinating the people involved. Gantt charts and project plans aren't enough, since they don't track the actual interactions between the people involved in the project. Once the work gets kicked off, there is the need to be able to track, control and coordinate the people processes involved in the actual execution of project.
They handle the "outside the box" issues and innovation. They have no predefined set of rules that can describe the people and expertise needed to complete the process, and people outside the department or even the organization may take part in the process. They are what make your business unique and valuable--and ignoring them is not an option.