Building the Organizer for the Procedures
What is a Process Organizer?
Most of the content of the manual will reside in the Procedures section. The most critical factor to consider when developing an organizer for the procedures is maintainability. Procedures will change, so they should be organized so that updates will be easy and efficient. For this reason, organizing the procedures by process works best.
What's the difference between a process and a procedure? Simply put:
- A process is an outcome.
- A procedure describes how a process is currently performed within an organization (i.e., how the outcome is achieved).
By way of example, "invoice payment" is a process shared by most organizations. Most, if not all, organizations have vendors who invoice for delivered products or services. Going forward, chances are that organizations will continue receiving invoices which require payment. The outcome of this process is a "paid invoice". How invoices are paid in an organization is the procedure.
A procedure is unique to the organization based on a variety of factors, including the organization's systems, controls and process efficiencies. As the organization changes its systems or controls or introduces new efficiencies, the procedure will change. The need for the process or outcome, in this case "invoice payment", within the organization, however, generally remains fairly constant over time. For this reason, utilizing a Process Organizer or Map for housing procedures facilitates on-going maintenance of the procedures.
The next sections describe how to construct a Process Organizer. As with the Manual Organizer, it is useful to treat the Process Organizer as a draft until the manual is finalized. The draft Process Organizer should be reviwed with the project sponsor. This review is generally done at the same time as the review of the Manual Organizer.
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