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James Brimson in his book "The Handbook of
Process-based Accounting, Leveraging Processes to Predict Results
published by American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, say:
- "process capability is measure of range of
work that a process can cope with... Process capabilities are a
measure of scope or breadth of work the process is qualified to
effectively handle."
An example will help you understand this. A hospital may design a process to
correct near or far sighted patients. This process uses vary expensive and very
precise equipment. Using this same equipment to cut down trees in a forest would
not be cost effective. However, the trees would be cut far more accurately.
Meanwhile using an axe to cut trees in the forest may be very cost
effective and sufficiently precise. However, the axe would not meet patient
expectations for correcting their vision problems.
So this examples shows that these two processes (i.e., improving patient
vision and cutting trees with an axe) were designed with different process
capabilities. They were both designed to be cost effective and meet customer
expectations.
Understand that no matte how well the lumberjack executes the process,
cutting with an axe will never have the process capabilities to meet patient
expectations. So understand that:
- better employee selection,
- higher quality materials (e.g. better steel in axe)
- more careful execution
- superior initial and follow-up training
are not always the answer. Sometimes the process just needs to be
reengineered to match the process capability to the desired outcomes of your
customers.
Call John Antos, Jim Brimson or Pat Dowdle at
972-980-7407 to find out more about Process Management.
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