On becoming a process-enabled organization: How to seed a culture of quality in a postacquisition environment

On Becoming a Process-EnabledOrganization: How to Seed a Cultureof Quality in a PostacquisitionEnvironment CHARLES PARKER

Misaligned processes and disparate cultures canplague M&As for years after the deals close. As thiscase study illustrates, a practical yet inexpensive ap-proach can drive process improvement and qual-ity in a transition-weary, cost-wary organizationthrough organic bottom-up and top-down change.The author discusses a model of process evolutionin organizations and the potentially disruptive effectof M&As, particularly successive deals. He then de-scribes a relatively simple statistical method for as-sessing process quality; its successful application ina postacquisition environment; and organizationalconsiderations, including influence models and therole of sponsors and champions, for shepherdingan organization toward greater process quality andrigor. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

With the rapid pace of mergers and acquisitions,cultures collide in the attempt to integrate dis-parate processes, driving process change fasterthan the acquired organization—and sometimes thepurchaser—has the capability to evolve. In manycases, the culture has yet to embrace the conceptsof quality, measurement, and process improvement.Rather than attempting to introduce a sophisticatedmethodology such as Six Sigma or Lean, which islikely to overwhelm the organization, a simpler, lessthreatening approach can plant the seeds for a shiftto a culture of quality and an appreciation for scruti-nizing disparate processes—or indeed any process—for alignment and improvement.

This article will focus first on the evolution of pro-cess in organizations, and then examine how merg-

ers and acquisitions can short-circuit this evolution,with negative consequences for the ability of the dealto produce the desired returns. Next it will explore asolution for such situations, where even a person in aposition of limited direct authority can use influenceand a simple, objective methodology to demonstratethe value of process quality and plant the seeds forculture change.

Process Evolution—or Not

As a business grows, so does the organization andthe complexity of its work, which leads to greaterinterdependencies. Process evolves naturally as away to manage greater size and complexity. Con-sider the model in Exhibit 1.

The entrepreneurial stage, the box at the far left ofthe model, is as close to an absence of process as youcan get in a business. At this stage, the organizationis small and agile. Because managers have limitedspan of control and the organizational structure isrelatively flat with few levels, decision making is cen-tralized, and for the most part, everyone knows whateveryone else is doing without the need for formalcommunication. This organization delivers success-fully through hard work, speed, and flexibility ratherthan because of process efficiency.

In the next stage of evolution, business growthhas brought more staff, more organizational layers,more distributed decision making, and with thesethe need for formal communication and other pro-cesses to coordinate major work activities and the

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c© 2009 by Anthony Minste in . Repr inted by permission. Al l r ights reserved.Publ ished onl ine in Wi ley InterScience (www.interscience.wi ley .com)Global Business and Organizat ional Excel lence • DOI : 10.1002/ joe .20306 • January/February 2010

Exhibit 1. Evolution of Process in Organizations

EntrepreneurialProcess-Centric

Process-Inhibited

Process-Enabled

interdependencies among those activities. To be ef-fective, the organization learns to be process-centric,gradually formalizing the way work gets done, deci-sions get made, and so forth. Process has become anecessary fact of life.

The next evolutionary step can go in one of twodirections:

� Process evolves with business and organizationalneeds and is continuously improved and refined inorder to facilitate optimal outcomes. The process-enabled organization drives for ever more effi-cient and effective processes, with a strong focuson the value added.

� Alternatively, the organization can become overlyfocused on process, which is increasingly bureau-cratic, administrative, and dysfunctional. Thisimposes rigidity, extra costs, longer cycle times,and so forth, without adding commensurate valueto the outcome, to the overall detriment ofproductivity. At this stage, the organization isprocess-inhibited.

At each stage in the model shown in Exhibit 1, acompany’s approach to process is an outgrowth ofits culture. The process-enabled organization, for ex-ample, has embraced quality as part of its culture—

not just the classic quality control perspective in itsmanufacturing processes but as a broader mind-setdirected toward process excellence in all its activi-ties. Maintaining high process quality is key for as-suring processes produce optimal outcomes, onesthat create real value for all stakeholders.

The evolution from entrepreneurial to process-centric and then to either process-enabled orprocess-inhibited is normally a natural transitionover time, with process growth driven by and instep with business and organizational growth. Butsometimes it doesn’t happen. For example, an en-trepreneurial organization, flush with success, re-sists the discipline required to systematize its work,and the work becomes unmanageable. The organi-zation’s projects and activities fail in spite of every-one’s efforts and bright ideas.

A process-inhibited organization can become aprocess-enabled organization by rectifying its mono-lithic processes, but this doesn’t often happen as anatural transition. It is difficult to acknowledge in-ternally that processes have become barriers to bet-ter performance (although people affected by sucha process are usually acutely aware of its nega-tive impact), and by this time many people de-rive their power in the organization from these

Global Business and Organizat ional Excel lence January/February 2010 27DOI : 10.1002/ joe

processes. It often takes a significant external changein circumstances—an aggressive competitor or aneconomic downturn, for instance—to get the organi-zation’s attention, and even then it might require anoutsider or a persistent insider to “tell the emperorhe has no clothes” and press the case for moving toa culture of quality.

The Impact of M&As on Process Evolution

Process evolution can be short-circuited by a precip-itous event, one of the most common being a mergeror acquisition—disruptive growth that changes thegame overnight. The attempt to integrate two—insome cases, more—organizations and cultures putstremendous pressure on processes. Even if the ac-quired business is allowed to continue operatingfairly independently, the new owner inevitably im-poses higher expectations for performance, and forreporting it, which will affect internal processes.

Process evolution can be short-circuited by a precip-itous event, one of the most common being a mergeror acquisition—disruptive growth that changes thegame overnight.

Take the actual case of a hundred-year-old family-owned coffee company—for our purposes, let’s referto it as Java Joe—that was purchased by one of theworld’s largest food conglomerates. The coffee com-pany’s senior leaders had all grown up in the busi-ness and were strongly wedded to “the way we’vealways done things around here.” It had producedsuccess for a long time, and as a result, Java Joe hadlittle in the way of formal process.

The food conglomerate, seeing a way to capital-ize on the coffee company’s name recognition anddistribution channels, transferred some of its otherdrink products into the coffee company to broadenits offerings, and suddenly Java Joe had become a

beverage company. The parent company had solidprocesses, a formal management style, and highexpectations for receiving a good return on the priceit paid for the acquisition. It was willing to grantoperating autonomy to the coffee-now-beveragecompany as long as it met the parent’s performanceexpectations.

Despite now having a much broader product line tomanage, Java Joe’s leaders resisted changing theirinformal methods of operating. The parent com-pany had made some training available to help JavaJoe employees and managers learn to plan for on-time delivery and build strong customer relation-ships. But the leaders regarded process and projectmanagement as “too much talk and not enough ac-tion.” From their perspective, who needed processesand measures when everyone “knew when to jumpin and help”?

Lack of process was now a detriment in the morecomplex beverage company, the business did notperform well as a result, and Java Joe could not meetits owner’s expectations. Finally, after four yearsof lackluster performance, top executives from thefood company ran out of patience and decided toexercise greater control by eliminating the top threeleadership jobs at Java Joe and transferring all oper-ations to the home office, where the food company’sprocesses and culture were firmly established. JavaJoe would continue to exist in name only.

The “Play-Doh” Company

The attempts of an acquiring company to align keyprocesses across organizations at different stages inthe process evolution model will inevitably produceresistance. And any attempts to align key processeswithout a systematic approach to process changefurther increases the likelihood that acquisitions willnot deliver their full value.

A symptom of this problem is what I refer to asthe “Play-Doh” company, often the result of a

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company’s aggressive M&A strategy, in which itbuys and consolidates companies in rapid succes-sion, often before the prior purchase has been fullyintegrated. Each acquisition is like a lump of coloredPlay-Doh, the color representing its culture and ap-proach to process. The acquirer scoops the individ-ual lumps together into one ball (the enterprise), butthe colors are still distinct—no real integration hasoccurred, and cultures and processes are not alignedbut rather function in parallel, in the best case, orin conflict, as is more often the case. This mightnot be a problem unless the rationale for the ac-quisitions is to create efficiencies and capitalize onsynergies—gained in part from having uniform orcommon processes, or simply from greater processrigor. What acquisitions don’t have these as goals toone degree or another?

Another compounding factor in the Play-Doh com-pany is what I call the Tower of Babel effect: the lackof a common lexicon for communicating importantinformation and concepts. Most professional fieldshave evolved their own terminology, or language,and in most organizational cultures, that languagehas taken on a specific meaning that may or may notbe in line with textbook definitions. In the Tower ofBabel effect, people in the different merged or ac-quired companies use the same terms but there is noagreement across the enterprise about what thoseterms actually mean. As an example, in the vernacu-lar of project management, the common term criticalpath task is a task that, if delayed, will jeopardizethe project schedule. However, the term is used moregenerically in some organizations to refer to a taskthat is simply viewed as “important” without con-sideration of its impact on project schedule. In thePlay-Doh company, whose various acquisitions stillretain their own lexicons, people can leave a meet-ing believing they are all in agreement, having useda common term but without realizing that it meansdifferent things in different parts of the enterprise—the fact is, they haven’t agreed at all, whichwill become painfully apparent somewhere downthe road.

The various acquisitions in a Play-Doh companymay be at different stages of process evolution—entrepreneurial, process-centric, and so forth—andthe acquiring company, faced with massive growthand integration challenges over a relatively short pe-riod of time, is likely inexperienced in managing pro-cess change and alignment of this scale. Is there away to instill greater process discipline in the or-ganization, in the midst of all the other changes itis struggling to absorb, without overwhelming it orgenerating resistance?

In the case that follows, an enterprisewide projectwas experiencing postacquisition difficulty. Theproject leader, with my help, introduced greater pro-cess and measurement rigor to the project with theuse of a relatively simple data-based approach forassessing process quality and prioritizing improve-ments. The successful effort planted the seeds of aculture of quality, mobilizing broader change fromthe bottom up as well as the top down.

In the Tower of Babel effect, people in the differentmerged or acquired companies use the same termsbut there is no agreement across the enterprise aboutwhat those terms actually mean.

Choosing the Right Opportunity

A regional financial services company, which we’llcall Alpha, made a series of rapid acquisitions ofsimilar companies in other geographies to expandits product lines and customer base. The acquireesbrought with them a number of their own recentlypurchased companies. In a matter of a few years,Alpha, now nearly triple its original size, had be-come a Play-Doh company of a dozen or so enti-ties. Some were process-enabled, while some wereprocess-inhibited, and all still retained their ownprocesses and cultures.

As an early step toward greater process align-ment across the new enterprise, Alpha appropriately


looked at ongoing projects to see where thoseprojects could scale from regional to corporate so-lutions. One such project was the development of aparticular enterprise information management sys-tem, a single database and IT system to replace themultiple legacy databases and systems that existed inthe acquired companies. It was viewed as an impor-tant tool for standardizing and enhancing a numberof key business processes across the enterprise.

Even good systems and processes that have served aregional business well do not necessarily scale upto meet the needs of an enterprise or its entitiesin other regions or countries, which may have dis-similar market conditions, regulatory requirements,and business needs. As Alpha acquired additionalcompanies, so grew the number of products, cus-tomers, suppliers, information systems, and regula-tory scrutiny, and the complexity of the envisionedenterprise database solution escalated. The projectwas missing deadlines and running over budget—facts apparent even to those of us in the corporateIT organization who were not directly associatedwith the project.

Even good systems and processes that have serveda regional business well do not necessarily scale upto meet the needs of an enterprise or its entities inother regions or countries, which may have dissimi-lar market conditions, regulatory requirements, andbusiness needs.

I knew the project leader, Kelly (not her real name),and thought I could be of help. In my work at othercompanies prior to Alpha, I had learned the powerof analytical tools and measurement for findingthe root cause of process problems and identifyingthose improvements that will have the greatest pos-itive impact on process outcomes. This had growninto a deep appreciation for how a broader cultureof quality in an organization leads to higher process

and business performance. Since projects are a col-lection of processes and subprocesses, I thought myexperience would be an asset to Kelly’s project, andit might also be a way to begin, albeit on a smallscale, to demonstrate the value of process improve-ment to other parts of Alpha that were strugglingwith process alignment and change in their postac-quisition environment.

I approached Kelly with the idea, and her responsewas, “I don’t need someone to tell me that some-thing’s wrong—I already know that. I need some-one to tell me what I have to do differently,and then help me fix it.” In short, Kelly wantedsolutions, and I was prepared to commit to deliv-ering them. I explained the concept and importanceof process quality, what it entailed, and how I felt Icould be of assistance to her in embedding qualityin her project. I committed, and Kelly agreed, to thefollowing:

1. Conduct an objective, statistical quality assess-ment of the current state of the project.

2. Identify the root causes that were creatingproblems.

3. Rationally prioritize improvement opportunities.4. Develop specific recommendations for action.5. Document all this in a formal report for her and

her boss, a senior IT leader.

In the sections that follow, I’ll discuss the approachI used for Kelly’s project and the principles that in-form it.

Finding the Root Cause of Process Problems

You can’t fix something if you don’t know why itisn’t working. And what is often seen as a problemis really a symptom of a deeper problem. In order tobring higher quality to any process, the symptomsof a problem must be clearly differentiated from theroot cause. For instance, in a manufacturing pro-cess, a part that repeatedly has higher defects thanthe allowable tolerances in the specifications might


at first appear to be the result of a poorly designedproduction process, but it could also be a symptomof a machine not being properly maintained, or of adefective cutter. The solutions in each case would bequite different. Identifying and measuring the rootcause of a process problem makes it possible to ob-jectively assess the return on improvement (i.e., tobe able to articulate the value of the solution), whichis essential for aligning support for change.

Most process problems can be traced to a handfulof process deficiencies or cultural/people issues:

� Absent, outdated, unrealistic, or excessively ad-ministrative and bureaucratic processes. Thingsget done in spite of the process, but with a directimpact on efficiency and speed-to-market.

� Too many processes, not synched with each other(a process Tower of Babel), or all process is ig-nored, or teams create their own. Larger projectssuffer from lack of coordination and communica-tion. This has a direct impact on efficiency, speed-to-market, and cost.

� Outdated or nonexistent tools/templates. Theprocess is good, but without automation it iscumbersome or highly administrative, and thetemplates supporting the process are too cum-bersome.

� People. The managers and employees work hardand are committed, but they do not have the levelof capability demanded by the organization be-cause they lack one or more of the following:� Skills: They have insufficient training or

competency.� Experience: They have insufficient vertical job

knowledge in the relevant areas, often becauseprior jobs have not prepared them for the cur-rent challenges.

� Knowledge base: They know no other way ofdoing something, often because that’s how it’sbeen done in the organization for years.

� Communication. The organization agrees on adecision, but because it does not have objectivedata on which to base the decision, and/or the

same terms have different meaning (the Tower ofBabel effect again), the decision constantly under-goes further discussion.

Finding the root cause of problems in a process be-gins with collecting information on how the pro-cess is currently functioning (or not functioning).Organizations that are not process-enabled oftendo not have metrics for assessing process perfor-mance. In such cases, information about a process,its components, and its outcomes must be obtainedthrough structured interviews with participants—the employees and managers directly involved in theprocesses—and, if appropriate, with process stake-holders (e.g., executives, customers [internal, exter-nal], and suppliers [internal, external]). For theenterprise database project assessment, I interviewedmembers of the team from IT and the businesses.Another source of information about patterns ofprocess problems is to review lessons learned fromprior projects or execution in the organization.

The Quality Assessment Model

Part of the challenge of embedding quality in anorganization’s culture is the lack of an objectivebasis for problem identification and resolution. Asa result, the organization may have little tolerancefor, or even the ability to absorb, the complexmeasurement systems found in Six Sigma or otherdata-driven improvement models. Furthermore,busy executives rarely want to dive into such de-tails. The quality assessment model does not—andshould not—be complex. Rather, it should groundthe analysis in solid but relatively simple statisticalmeasures that are easily understood and communi-cated and that serve as an objective basis for devel-oping recommendations.

The model provides a framework for a dialogue withthe individuals involved in the process (i.e., the in-terviewees), and then for analysis of their responses.It sets out to answer the following questions:

� Is a formal process in place?


� Is it consistently followed (variance)?� Is it consistently understood (variance)?� What areas need improvement?� Is there any evidence of metrics?

Industry Standards and Best Practices

The assessment model is tailored to the particu-lar type of work being evaluated. The questionspresented to interviewees are based on an indus-try standard methodology or best practices, and/orcommon-sense business practices (i.e., processes andpractices widely accepted as effective for the partic-ular type of work being done). For example, Kelly’sproject was delivering an information technologysolution through a project work structure, and so Iused the following industry sources to develop theassessment questions:

� Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMi),a model for business process improvement;

� the Project Management Institute (PMI); and� the Information Technology Infrastructure

Library (ITIL).

Other sources of standards for a wide range of pro-cesses include professional organizations overseeinga particular discipline (e.g., IEEE), industry stan-dards (e.g., health care), and quality assurance stan-dards.

Categories of Work

Drawing from these sources, the process or projectis broken down into major work components, orprocesses groups, deemed important according toindustry/professional sources and standards. As anexample, using the CMMi, PMI, and the ITIL stan-dards, I was able to identify ten process groups, orassessment areas, relevant to the enterprise databaseproject:

1. Project Charter—Initiation2. Schedule—Planning3. Business Requirements4. Customer Requirements Contract

5. Analysis and Design6. Quality Planning7. Program Oversight8. Configuration and Release Management9. Testing Management

10. Lessons Learned

In turn, I developed ten questions for each of theseassessment areas to explore with interviewees. Basedon standards and best practices, each question refersto a particular aspect or subprocess in that processgroup. For example, a question under AssessmentArea #1, Project Charter—Initiation, dealt withwhether “the project scope is clear, documented, andagreed to by stakeholders,” and one of the questionsfor Assessment Area #2, Schedule—Planning, askedif “the plan has a clear process for escalating risksand issues.”

Assessment Method

The development of the assessment model and thedata collection/interviews might take a few weeks,but the analysis should be simple enough so that itcan be completed within a couple of hours and cap-tured in an uncomplicated spreadsheet. Too muchinvestment in time or effort could be a barrier togaining support for the assessment.

The development of the assessment model and thedata collection/interviews might take a few weeks,but the analysis should be simple enough so thatit can be completed within a couple of hours andcaptured in an uncomplicated spreadsheet.

I used the following types of statistical assessmentsfor responses to each question about the project pro-cesses or subprocess:

� Simple ratings—e.g., a five-point scale where 5 =Always, 3 = Sometimes, 1 = Never

� Variances—difference in responses by multiplerespondents/interviewees


Exhibit 2. Prioritization of Improvement Opportunities Based on Quality Assessment Scores

Score Risk Code Status

x ≥ 4.0 Controlled Green No action need be taken.

3.0 < x > 4.0

Serious YellowA process exists but is not consistently followed. We will see improvement by formalizing the process and ensuring it is followed consistently.

x ≤ 3.0 Urgent Red

No process exists. This is an area of weakness. What gets done happens on the fly, inconsistently, and produces inconsistent results. This area is the most prone to producing errors.

� Summarization—a score, the average/mean of allinterviewees’ ratings, that summarizes responsesin an objective, easy-to-understand measure foreach question, assessment area, and the overallproject/process

These assessments are simple, easy to perform andcommunicate, and yet powerful enough to surfaceissues and root causes.

An absence of data is also of value: if a questioncan’t be answered, it points to the lack of a for-mal process, which is often the case in an ad hocculture that relies on muscle strength rather thaneffective communication or cooperation to deliverresults.

Priorities for Improvement

A further aspect of the assessment is a straight-forward means for determining the relative impor-tance of problems so that the organization canprioritize for action those where improvement islikely to have the greatest positive impact on out-comes/deliverables. For Kelly’s project assessment,I developed three priority categories to denotethe level of risk to the project/process outcomes.Exhibit 2 provides a description of each risk cate-gory. A simple three-color code denotes the questionor area’s priority category based on its score:

� Controlled—Green; score ≥ 4.0� Serious—Yellow; 3.0 < score > 4.0� Urgent—Red; score ≤ 3.0

Assessment Area Summary

Exhibit 3 shows the results of the enterprise databaseproject assessment for Assessment Area #1, ProjectCharter—Initiation (how this organization startsprojects). The spreadsheet displays the three typesof assessments described earlier:

� Rating columns (the far right-hand columns inthe worksheet): each interviewee’s rating, on ascale 1 to 5, of whether the particular subprocessis followed.

� Variance column: degree of variance among in-terviewees’ ratings

� Score column: the average of all interviewees’ratings

In Exhibit 3, the risk color code has been convertedto light gray (Controlled), dark gray (Serious), andblack (Urgent), and is displayed in the Score columnfor each question and in the Overall Status columnfor the assessment area as a whole.

A large value in the Variance column also flags aprocess or practice with high potential risk. A largedeviation among interviewees’ responses/ratings, onthe order of 4.0, indicates one of the following:

� The practice is informal.� No formal practice exists (and everyone works in

a different manner).� A formal practice exists but is not followed.

In any case, a large variance denotes an Urgent riskand an excellent candidate for improvement.


Exhibit 3. Results for Assessment Area 1, Project Charter—Initiation

Ref. Assessment Area

Score (1 = Never, 3 =

Sometimes, 5 = Always)

Overall Status

Vari

an

ce

Inte

rvie

wee A

Inte

rvie

wee B

Inte

rvie

wee C

Inte

rvie

wee D

01-00 1—Project Charter—Initiation 2.9 URGENT

01-01 Project initiation starts from objective assessment and agreement on priorities

3.5 4.0 1 5 3 5

01-02 If project effort > 1,000 hours, a charter was created

5.0 - 5 5 5 5

01-03 If project effort > 1,000 hours, an independent quality Charter inspection was performed and checklist stored on project sharepoint site

1.0 - 1 1 1 1

01-04 If project charter was not used, a suitable replacement was used in its place

3.0 - 3 3 3 3

01-05 Project is budgeted and funded 5.0 - 5 5 5 5

01-06 Project scope is clear, documented, and agreed to by stakeholders

2.0 2.0 1 1 3 3

01-07 Project is on the plan of record. 3.0 - 3 3 3 3

01-08 A documented project scope process is defined

2.0

2.0 1 3 3 1

1-09 The project scope change process differentiates between projects with material change of schedule and budget and the need for sponsor approval

2.0 2.0 1 3 3 1

01-10 The project steering committee has clarity on their role as point of escalation for changes, risks, and issues.

1.0

- 1 1 1 1

The overall status for the Project Charter—Initiationassessment area is Urgent, reflecting an overwhelm-ing number of “Never” responses, or cases where theorganization was not using recommended best prac-tices (according to the accepted industry standards).This assessment area is, as an ex-sniper friend of

mine used to say, a “target-rich environment” forimprovement.

Assessment Summary

The Assessment Summary Sheet, shown in Exhibit 4for the enterprise database project, presents the


Exhibit 4. Assessment Summary—Overall Status/Risk of

Assessment Areas

Assessment AreaOverall

Status

QA

Score

1—Project Charter—Initiation 2.9

2—Schedule—Planning SERIOUS 3.2

3—Business Requirements URGENT 1.4

4—Customer Requirements Contract SERIOUS 3.4

5—Analysis & Design URGENT 2.8

6—Quality Planning CONTROLLED 4.3

7—Program Oversight CONTROLLED 4.1

8—Configuration and Release Management CONTROLLED 4.5

9—Testing Management CONTROLLED 4.1

10—Lessons Learned URGENT 2.7

Summary QA Score SERIOUS 3.3

URGENT

overall score for each assessment area and its color-coded improvement priority. In this case, the projectas a whole was rated at Serious risk. The opportu-nities for improvement abound, particularly in fourassessment areas rated Urgent: Initiation, Develop-ment of Business Requirements, Analysis and De-sign, and Lessons Learned. The detailed assessmentsheets (Exhibit 2) also show the specific improve-ment opportunities in each area.

When I met with Kelly and her project team to re-view the Assessment Summary and the detailed eval-uations for the ten assessment areas, they expressedconcern about some of the assessment results—anddefensive reactions in a few instances. Since I wasable to reference the detailed replies of intervieweesrelative to a set of solid industry best practices, thedata spoke for itself, and the team members wereable to move through their initial reactions and be-gin to focus on making improvements.

The Assessment Summary and its clear delineationof high-priority improvement opportunities should

guide the development of a manageable set of rec-ommendations. For the enterprise database project,I presented the following series of recommendedchanges to Kelly and her team, again drawing on ITand project management standards and best prac-tices:

� Use an “agile” (i.e., iterative) approach to devel-oping business requirements for the system.

� Time-box the business requirements (i.e., desig-nate a specific period of time to allow for furtherelaboration of the requirements).

� Bring users, business stakeholders, and the ITteam together in meetings to jointly develop thebusiness requirements.

� Prototype the application and use the prototypeto further refine requirements.

� Use an iterative approach for deployment togather feedback and lessons learned that wouldinform the next deployment.

These five recommendations addressed improve-ment opportunities in the business requirements,analysis and design, and lessons learned assess-ment areas. The fourth assessment area with anUrgent risk rating, Project Charter—Initiation, re-flected broader process deficiencies across the enter-prise (including governance and decision making)—another symptom of a Play-Doh company—thatwere well beyond the ability of the project team tochange.

Process Metrics

Measures are at the heart of process quality, impor-tant for monitoring the impact of the improvementsas well as the ongoing performance of the process. Inorganizations struggling to become process-enabled,few meaningful process metrics are likely to be inplace. One of the deliverables of a quality assessmentis identification of a number of key process/projectmetrics for gauging process health going forward.The metrics should be objective and reflect perfor-mance improvements that deliver real value to theteam or organization. Data for the metrics should


also be easy to collect. The nature of the specific met-rics will vary, of course, depending on the process.Baseline data for each measure is collected as part ofthe quality assessment to provide a reference pointfor monitoring the impact of the improvements overtime.

For the enterprise database project, which was con-cerned with development and enterprisewide imple-mentation of an IT system for the businesses, theparticular metrics I recommended reflected the fol-lowing aspects of both project and system perfor-mance:

� efficiency (e.g., speed and cost of delivery),� availability/stability (e.g., defects/errors),� reliability (e.g., total cost of ownership, mainte-

nance drain on innovation); and� customer satisfaction (e.g., delivery to end-user

requirements, customer mean time between fail-ures, etc.).

Process Monitoring

Regular monitoring of the values of the process met-rics will provide an objective measure of the impactof improvement actions and process health. Static ornegative trends in a metric could flag the need to ad-just the improvement plans or address improvementopportunities/needs in other areas and subprocesses.

In addition, the assessment model itself is a mecha-nism for continuous improvement of a process. Byrepeating the assessment at prescribed intervals, theprocess owner can track the impact of improvementactions on summary and detailed scores as well asidentify and take action on other improvement op-portunities identified in the analysis.

In for the Long Haul

I felt that to be a good quality leader in my com-pany, I had to share responsibility with the projectteam for making the recommendations work, to

help deliver the value that I had promised Kelly andher boss the process improvements would produce.I stayed “in the trenches” with the team throughthe implementation of the process changes, bringingboth my quality and IT expertise to the effort, andthen continued to monitor the performance of theproject and its processes over time.

Although I had IT expertise, a good quality leaderdoes not necessarily require subject expertise inorder to make a significant contribution to a par-ticular process or project. Quality knowledge andperspective will add value in the form of guidanceto process owners and their teams about what stepsare necessary to ensure adequate planning, develop-ment, testing, documentation, and measurement ofprocess improvements.

Organizational Considerations for Quality Leaders

You do not need formal authority to bring a qualitymind-set to an organization, but you will need thehelp of others over whom you may have no directauthority. To have a positive impact as a qualityleader requires an understanding of influence modelsand the critical role of sponsors and champions inpropagating change in an organization.

To have a positive impact as a quality leader requiresan understanding of influence models and the criti-cal role of sponsors and champions in propagatingchange in an organization.

Influence Models

There are many models for exercising influence, anumber of which are shown in Exhibit 5. A qualityleader might draw on more than one influence modelin a particular situation and will typically be able toexercise influence within the organization based onhis/her follow-through, technical, and competenceauthority.


Exhibit 5. Influence Models

Formal Authority Responsibility is defined as part of the position/job. Executives and managers have this authority fortheir assigned areas of responsibility.

Borrowed Authority “I work at the behest of the Department Manager.” People with borrowed authority are able toinfluence because they are perceived to speak with the authority of the executive or manager.

Technical Authority “E.F. Hutton says . . .” People with this authority are respected as technical experts, and their opinionis highly regarded.

Charismatic Authority Influence is via the force of personality. The downside of this type of influence is that the individualmay also be viewed as arrogant or a “know-it-all.”

Purse-String Authority Authority is derived from the ownership of resources (capital, funding, staff, processes). Supportorganizations with this authority can impede change efforts if they do not support an idea.

Competence Authority Much like technical authority but based less on demonstrated technical knowledge and more on havinga track record of intelligent decisions and actions.

Price-tag Authority “They cost so much, they must know.” Consultants frequently fall into this category, especiallyhigh-priced consultants.

Follow-through Authority A track record of meeting commitments. People using this authority have confidence based on theirability to execute well in the past.

Source: J. D. Frame, The New Project Management: Tools for an Age of Rapid Change, Complexity, and Other Business Realities (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2002),pp. 147–172.

Propagating Change

True sustainable culture change of the magnitudewe seek must occur from both the bottom up andtop down.

Bottom-up change occurs when teams or employeessee positive, discernible, measurable change result-ing from quality assessments and process improve-ments and then communicate the value to others—informally at the water cooler and formally to theirleaders. Senior leaders are usually too busy to getinto details, but they listen to certain well-placed em-ployees in whom they have confidence. The “buzz onthe street” speaks volumes about execution, whereemployees say to each other and their bosses, “Thisworks. You should do this.”

Top-down change occurs when senior leaders directthat their organization implement an approach orpractice for improving process quality because theyunderstand the value of measure-based improve-ments and have seen them demonstrated as greaterspeed, lower costs, higher quality, or other outcomesimportant to the business. Senior leaders say, “Ev-eryone should do this.”

Sponsors and Champions

Quality leaders will need to have sponsors andchampions in order to enact change in their orga-nization. By way of definition:

� Sponsors are typically senior leaders who haveprofit-and-loss responsibility, control over re-sources/funding, and influence beyond their as-signed areas, and often across the enterprise.

� Champions are typically leaders with a morelimited scope of responsibilities—running a de-partment, a support function, a project, or a ma-jor business process—and their direct influence isusually restricted to those areas.

Exhibit 6 compares the attributes of sponsors andchampions that are most pertinent for institutingchange and shifting culture. (Refer to Exhibit 5 fordefinitions of the types of influence/authority.)

Is it better to get sponsors? Absolutely. They are bestpositioned to create top-down change. But they arefrequently harder to access and influence. And, withprofit-and-loss (P&L) responsibilities, they may notwant to put all their eggs in one basket, preferring


Exhibit 6. Attributes of Sponsors and Champions

noipmahC rosnopS

Position in organization

Executive, senior manager Manager, project leader, process owner

Vision of process quality/improvement

Can appreciate the benefits for an entire organization

Specific to what you can do for them, their program or department

Scope of influence Beyond their assigned area of control, and sometimes global

Within assigned area of responsibility

Type of

influence/authority

Political (formal)

Technical/functional

Charismatic

Purse String

Technical/functional

Upwards: Top management Sponsor

Sideways: Peers (other executives, senior managers)

Peers (other managers/leaders) Influence pathways

Downwards: Their managers Their employees or teams

Scope of impact on culture/mind-set

Typically across a large portion of the organization; possibly across the enterprise

Typically within his/her own department/unit or team

instead to have a new approach piloted in oneof their areas—under a Champion, for instance—without a great deal of risk to the organization asa whole should the effort fail or encounter seriousproblems.

Champions, on the other hand, are normally moreaccessible and are frequently looking for ways toincrease the efficiency, speed of delivery, or qualityof the process or project within their sphere of re-sponsibility. While the part of the organization theycan directly impact may be limited, champions arenonetheless very important to creating “bottom-up”change. Successful efforts in their domain—at thegrass-roots level—generate buzz and demonstratethe value and benefits of better quality. Kelly, asproject leader of the enterprise database project, wasprecisely the champion I was looking for. She hadtactical responsibility for a troubled program andwas bright and open to any assistance or help. Inturn, she reported to an influential senior leader

at the enterprise level, who was a potential spon-sor for process-quality efforts on an even broaderbasis.

An ardent champion can be your best initial entreeto an influential sponsor, but you ultimately needboth champions and sponsors to create top-downand bottom-up change. Kelly exerted bottom-uppressure for greater quality, through reports to herboss about assessment results and the positive im-pact of the recommended changes on project qualityand outcomes, which in turn influenced her boss tosponsor quality assessments for other projects thatreported to him. Eventually other leaders acrossthe enterprise grew interested when they heardabout the positive results, and as either championsor sponsors, they began to request quality assess-ments for projects and processes in their areas ofresponsibility—a pattern that continues today as theenterprise and its businesses move toward greaterprocess alignment and quality.


Closing

The case of the enterprise database project illustratesan approach for propagating a culture of qualityacross an enterprise not yet process enabled—an or-ganization with its plate already full of postacquisi-tion integration issues that would likely reject a morecomplex, time-consuming, labor-intensive method-ology. Because the approach is relatively simple anddata-based, it empowers committed quality leadersto help a project, process, or their organization bethe best it can be.

Charles Parker is the pen name of an internal consultantfor a major U.S. company who has more than 30 years’experience in IT management and IT and organizationalconsulting. Certified as CSSMBB, PMP, and CMPE, he isalso an instructor in business and management at Universityof California Berkeley, Extension. He resides in Louisville,Kentucky, and can be reached at [email protected] article is based in part on a presentation to the2009 American Society for Quality World Conference onQuality.


Documents

On becoming a process-enabled organization: How to seed a culture of quality in a postacquisition environment