Introduction

The current performance of the firm highly depends on the business processes’ collective ability to meet the primary organizational goals. However, the extended terms of organization growth and overall performance rely on its ability to satisfy the exogenous changes required fully. Which include a difference in the life cycle of the product, entry of new competitors in the market and any other environmental change that may be experienced in the market environment (Wang 2017). Business Process Management is a structured approach that is used in modeling the processes so as to have a clear understanding, process documentation, modeling, activities analysis, simulation, processes execution and monitoring the continuous changes in the end to end business process and the available resources regarding the ability of the firm to add value to its business. It is a modern terminology that is used in encapsulating a process-driven strategy to meet enterprise operational efficiency (vom Brocke and Mendling, 2018). BPM employs the use of advancement in the technology in providing firms with the ability to map and remodel operations processes. It also helps deploy the processes as new adaptations that will integrate the new changes introduced with the existing software and equip the managers with the functionality ability to monitor, assess, control and improve, and execute the processes in the business operations.

Background

FI Hardware Store is retail in Mauritius selling paint and DIY hardware, and its primary customers are tradespersons, mostly painters. The retail is currently managed by the owner, and as employees, there are five retail attendants and a cashier. The warehouse, storing the hardware and paints, is attached to the retail. However, all the colors sold by the retail are not currently stored in the warehouse. Whenever there is an order for paint, not available in the store, the attendant request the color from the manufacturer.

Current Business Process Model

The retail attendant uses a catalog, which contains all DIY hardware available and all paint sold by the retail, to advise the customer. The catalog is updated weekly by the attendant, after doing inventory all available hardware in the warehouse and validating with manufacturers the availability of paints.

FI paint is currently reviewing all its processes and system to expand its number of shops through the following ways:

1. Scheduling, planning and assigning duties and responsibilities to the paint shop personnel to perform the painting projects
2. Effectively plan and develop necessary work schedules, material, and equipment usage schedules, prioritization of painting expenditures and laying out relevant procedures for equipment maintenance
3. Estimate the cost of material and labor
4. Monitor and plan material and equipment acquisition and managing their use
5. Maintain material records, payroll, and processes time and ensure submission of acquired reports
6. Equip employees with the necessary knowledge or inform them about the new changes, methods, procedures, and policies relating to their work station

Quality Problems

Although the firm can run some of the business processes based on the old system, we cannot rule out the fact that there are functions; such as prompt decision making, operations innovation, processes traceability function, and information visibility, that need proper maintenance using an independent platform and cannot be effectively managed manually. Below are some of the possible issues that FI hardware can face:

1. Inadequate reporting and processes certification: the hardware may become irrelevant and uncompetitive in the market when facing insufficient reporting. The market conditions are now becoming complex and extremely dynamic (Su and Cui, 2019). Accurate and timely reporting is required for the timely and precise decision-making process. Poor control and bad decision-making lead to missed business opportunities.
2. Insufficient planning and out of stock problems: due to smaller working margins, managing wastage in the organization is the primary source of scoping profits. Most of the wastage occurs due to inventory mismanagement and the available loopholes in the supply chain channels (Jones et al., 2017). Business requires systems that will help them in manipulating various inventory operations such as product shelf lifestyles, inbound and outbound logistics processes, and file maintenance of overlooked inventory or under looked prerequisites to hold premium inventory management standards (Jie and Gengatharen, 2019).
3. Lack of timely production process updates and quality control measures: poor processes visibility is a problem most companies are facing when managing their production processes.

Proposed processes

These quality processes will help the FI Hardware boost the quality of its services concerning service delivery to the customers, suppliers, competitors, and employees. It is necessary to increase confidence in the hardware’s output. By implementing these processes, the firm can boost the quality of deliverables, which is critical in achieving the overall success in meeting organizational goals (Jain and Ahuja 2016). The procedures will help the firm to:

a. Set quality goals to be met in the firm

b. Define the quality measurement matrix

c. Develop and take the required actions required in measuring the overall quality

d. Point out possible quality issues and suggest improvements

e. Identify and report the whole level of quality achieved in the hardware

This important as it helps in enabling the firm to perform quality assurance, engage in quality control, initiate quality improvement techniques, and implement quality management techniques.

Potential processes quality improvement

Processes quality improvement is made to make them useful. This is basically due to the idea that even the most efficient processes may not be effective in meeting the objectives of the firm (Moule et al., 2018). To ensure efficiency at FI Hardware, the following are some of the potential quality improvements required to make its processes more effective

i. Cost-cutting. Through the overall organizational restructuring process, reorganization, and process visualization, it is easy to identify existing redundancies and other methods that unnecessarily increase the overhead costs in the organization. Thus, unnecessary tasks are dropped, which will allow the reallocation of resources making the hardware spend less while the processes are flowing effectively.

ii. Reducing communication problems in the hardware: the overall idea of methods improvement is to improve overall functionality in the organization by cutting on communication issues; for example, reducing contact touchpoints between employees and the managers will lead to an overall improvement in the communication process.

iii. Process visualization: introducing processes modeling in the business makes it easier to make periodical processes audit and continuously make necessary improvements. Visualization will allow the firm to effectively follow processes channels and identify the bottlenecks as they happen or instances that can be used in making the process effective.  Processes auditing is among the most vital function in ensuring processes improvement due to the need to monitor every single process created in the firm. Without proper operations monitoring techniques, the firm is not in control over its processes.

iv. New generation activity-based costing to increase timeliness of decisions: business managers agree that the typical denominator in managing organizational threats to business sustainability is its ability to understand and manage various costs (Raja Sreedharan, Raju, and Srivatsa Srinivas, 2017). This will lead to a reduction in activity wait time, reducing human touchpoints in conducting different processes hence reducing the opportunity for error and increase the quality of service delivery in the firm.

Implementation

a. New generation activity-based costing accelerates timeliness of decision support that can be implemented through the use of activity-based costing (UBC). The strategy will help the firm to deliver actionable and detailed cost data throughout the process’s analytic environment and customer support line services, supplier contract modeling, and overall process improvement (Lee, Zhao and Lee 2019).

b. Processes visualization: most of the processes in the hardware involve several departments. To properly implement improve processes visualization, it is crucial to ensure input from these individual departments is considered (Lasrado and Uzbeck, 2017). Sourcing insight from these departments will make them feel part of the implementation process. Thus, they can quickly adapt the implementation process and spearhead it to ensure success.

c. Communication management: for proper implementation of the communication process in the hardware, it is essential to begin with the end goal in mind. The communication process desired in the firm should be adequately understood, ways it will be implemented, and the outcome of the process (Lewis 2017). This defines the business process needs and the reason it needs to apply. It was leading in the establishment of clear goals and a clear vision around the process.

d. Cost reduction: the process is effectively implemented through a party that owns the whole process. He makes the implementation process his priority and takes charge of the implementation process (Holweg, Staats, and Upton, 2018). At FI Hardware, it is ideal for the member of the management to take charge of the implementation process due to the sensitivity of the process. This is important in driving the overall adoption of the process by all departments.

Quality improvement implementation plan

Selection of the quality improvement process

The right process is chosen. It is essential to select a method that will be successful and produce the desired results. During the selection process, the following factors are considered:

i. Available gaps in the current operations and performance levels

ii. Is the process a strategic addition to the company’s operations?

iii. Employee and customer opinion on areas that require improvement

iv. Possible implementation resistance levels from customers, employees and other stakeholders

Assembly of the implementation team

Creating the right side is crucial for the successful quality process implementation. It is easier for the parties in hardware to embrace the introduced change when they are part of the team initiating the change (Brijs 2016). The choice of the team will be based on their knowledge, participation, and processes affected by the newly introduced process. For the method mentioned above, the most suitable team should be made up of 3-5 members. Roles of the team members have been discussed in appendix D

Process aim statement

This will help in answering the question of what the process needs to accomplish in the firm. Therefore, it leads to the reduction of implementation frustration, implementation failure, or possible resource wastage (Chang 2016). It is the implementation-specific statement that will help in achieving the desired outcome. The process statement should take the form of the SMART framework.

Implementation measures development

It ensures the implementation team notices changes as a result of the process adopted in the organization. It is essential in showing process outcomes and measurement of the overall impact of the project.

Identification of change ideas

Processes changes are monitored, and the way the process works is controlled. This is done by assessing the places the operations are being conducted. It is vital to follow the processes’ performance against the projected performances. The following actions are taken during the assessment of the process:

a. Documentation of the process’s steps

b. Time is taken to complete each process step

c. Record time required in completing the whole process

d. Note down the activity wait time

e. Identify possible wastes observed

Test change ideas

Before the processes are rolled out on a large scale, it is essential to monitor the impact of the change on a small scale. This is important to manage possible employee staff resistance. This is accomplished using the plan, do, study, act, style to help in the implementation planning and carryout test for each process introduced (Raja Sreedharan, Raju, and Srivatsa Srinivas, 2017).

Sustaining process improvement

Once the processes have been tested and changes identified that will lead to quality improvement in the organization, it is essential to maintain and introduce them throughout the firm. The following are some of the areas the team has to pay close attention to:

i. Involvement of the senior management

ii. Assign processes ownership to individuals

iii. Hardwire the required improvements by ensuring the involvement of all staff

iv. Communicate the processes improv3mnt witnessed

v. Ensure continuous measurement and monitoring of the outcome of the new processes

Time frame and efforts

Efforts used by an organization in the bid to improve quality in the organization require adequate and accurate measurement so as to determine if the desired quality is being achieved. The rationale used in overall quality improvement measurement is the belief that optimal performance reciprocates good quality practices and performance comparison between department and other organization help in overall quality improvement (Chaturvedi and Chakrabarti, 2017). In the recent past, most organizations have adopted the need to measure their operation quality and reporting the performance levels.

Complex of the current market environment, uncertain and unpredictable future and the product and operational differentiation among firms makes quality measurement a difficult undertaking. One of the problems faced in measuring quality in most organization is the variability attributed to different management cognitive reasoning, problem solving process, discretionary decision-making process and experimental management knowledge exercised by managers. Another problem is an opinionated view of whether the processes near miss could have led to the processes harm.

Quality improvement strategies

The following are some of the concept that will help improve quality in the organization

1. Establishment of quality culture in the organization: organizational practices, processes, production procedures should be integrated with quality improvement efforts. Creation of quality improvement culture helps create passionate team that embrace quality in the organization. Quality improvement culture requires a different approach in each process within the organization, thus the organization can ensure creation of a quality dedicated team, holding occasional meetings dedicated to fostering quality improvement and adopting various policies that foster quality improvement (Mikhailov and Razmochaeva, 2018).
2. Identify and prioritize potential areas that require quality improvement: various ways in which quality can be improved in the organization needs to be identified. Examining organizational practices and operation procedures can be useful in isolating areas that require quality improvement
3. Collecting and analyzing relevant data: proper and accurate data collection forms a backbone of quality improvement. The collected data is vital in determining how the operations in the firm are being conducted, identify areas that require improvement and measure quality improvement goals.

Business Process Management

Implementation of a transformative quality implementation will ensure a proactive retailing processes at FI hardware when a fundamental digital business transformation program. To create processes transformation, the shop will first create a holistic and transparent perspective of all the operations. This will offer the firm with control, governance and market visibility required in ensuring quality processes and products. which can be achieved through:

1. Uncover various opportunities
   1. Quickly recognize various service implications and overall costs of the decisions made in the hardware
   1. Set quality objectives based on the accurate information

Recommendations

In this report, I am recommending the adoption of quality improvement culture in the organization. The culture of the organizational attitude, actions and behavior will reflect the drive employees have in meeting the quality improvement objectives. This will be essential in ensuring quality improvement is observed in the organization every day.

assumptions

1. Learning to lead quality improvement change: the strategy recommended assumes that the management of the organization will readily accept to lead the organization in ensuring that quality improvement culture is adopted.
2. The strategy also assumes that the quality improvement process be initiated right at the first stages of the production process.

Quality improvement tools

Use of flowcharts: they describe detailed quality improvement by using graphical representation of the strategy adopted. It illustrates all relevant processes considered by the team leading the quality improvement. As illustrated in the Appendix E.

Pareto diagrams: this tool helps in ranking organizational data in hierarchical order which ensures correction of significant problems. The pareto data analysis technique is used in analyzing data improvement by evaluating non conformity in the primary data. It is the commonly used tool in analyzing primary data in the organization, however, it can be used in analyzing all kinds of data. The diagram is shown as Figure 2 in the appendix.

References

Brijs, B., (2016). Business analysis for business intelligence. CRC Press.

Chang, J.F., (2016). Business process management systems: strategy and implementation. CRC Press.

Chaturvedi, S. and Chakrabarti, D., (2017). Operational efficiency in manufacturing process using design of experiments. International Journal of Process Management and Benchmarking, 7(2), pp.249-261.

Holweg, M., Staats, B.R. and Upton, D.M., (2018). Making process improvements stick. Kenan Institute of Private Enterprise Research Paper, (18-22).

Jones, K.K., Zenk, S.N., Tarlov, E., Powell, L.M., Matthews, S.A. and Horoi, I., (2017). A step-by-step approach to improve data quality when using commercial business lists to characterize retail food environments. BMC research notes, 10(1), p.35.

Jain, S.K. and Ahuja, I.S., (2016). Evaluation of business performance measurements for ISO 9000 initiatives in Indian manufacturing industry. International Journal of Process Management and Benchmarking, 6(1), pp.29-56.

Jie, F. and Gengatharen, D., (2019). Australian food retail supply chain analysis. Business Process Management Journal.

Lasrado, F. and Uzbeck, C., (2017). The excellence quest: a study of business excellence award-winning organizations in UAE. Benchmarking: An International Journal.

Lee, C.H., Zhao, X. and Lee, Y.C., (2019). Service quality driven approach for innovative retail service system design and evaluation: A case study. Computers & Industrial Engineering, 135, pp.275-285.

Lewis, W.E., (2017). Software testing and continuous quality improvement. CRC press.

Moule, P., Clompus, S., Fieldhouse, J., Ellis‐Jones, J. and Barker, J., (2018). Evaluating the implementation of a quality improvement process in general practice using a realist evaluation framework. Journal of evaluation in clinical practice, 24(4), pp.701-707.

Mikhailov, Y.I. and Razmochaeva, N.V., (2018), September. The Problems of Quality Management Automation in Retail Sales. In 2018 IEEE International Conference” Quality Management, Transport and Information Security, Information Technologies”(IT&QM&IS) (pp. 372-375). IEEE.

Raja Sreedharan, V., Raju, R. and Srivatsa Srinivas, S., (2017). A review of the quality evolution in various organisations. Total Quality Management & Business Excellence, 28(3-4), pp.351-365.

Su, Z. and Cui, L., (2019), July. Business Practice of Service Design in New Retail Era in China. In International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction (pp. 337-353). Springer, Cham.

Wang, S., (2017). Improving China department stores through total quality management. The Chinese Economy, 50(2), pp.128-138.

vom Brocke, J. and Mendling, J., (2018). Frameworks for business process management: a taxonomy for business process management cases. In Business Process Management Cases (pp. 1-17). Springer, Cham.