Mapping Work Processes

Rating:
Summary: Undergraduate Introductory Reference
Review: For the cost of the book, I was expecting some more advanced concepts than examples such as how to set a table, get gas for your car, and get ready for work. This is a workbook for students learning for the first time how to create workflow diagrams. For a working professional, it is useless. It does not deal with real work situations and its complexities.

Rating:
Summary: Disappointingly Simple
Review: For the cost of the book, I was expecting some more advanced concepts than examples such as how to set a table, get gas for your car, and get ready for work. This is a workbook for students learning for the first time how to create workflow diagrams. For a working professional, it is useless. It does not deal with real work situations and its complexities.

Rating:
Summary: WOW! Process Mapping
Review: I highly recommend this book to the skilled and unskilled. This a very informative book that includes "buzzwords" often used by the gurus-puts it in laymen terms. A great source for educating clients and students on process mapping. Thorough and comprehensible. The price makes it more accessible to the average business person.

Rating:
Summary: Buy only if you know NOTHING about process mapping
Review: The author explains basics in painful detail. The example used are purposely non-business (setting the table, getting gas for your car) so as to illustrate the "concept" of process mapping. So, if you know absolutely nothing about process mapping, I suppose this is a good place to start. However, this is SO basic, it would also help your appreciation of this book if you were a complete dolt. If, on the other hand, you are looking for practical applications to your work processes (rather than seeting your table or getting gas for your car), you're in the wrong book! Similarly, if you'd like to get past the basics, then you have to go past this book.

Rating:
Summary: Short and to the point - excellent for beginners
Review: This 89 page book has two things going for it:

(1) Logical approach to mapping work processes

(2) Clear, concise writing

Ms. Galloway's logical approach to mapping work processes is evident from the table of contents, which contains:

Introduction to Mapping

Select the Process

Define the Process

Chart the Primary Process

Chart Inspection Points

Develop Inspection Standards

Draw Lines and Arrows

Chart Inputs and Suppliers

Chart Subprocesses

Plan Future Activities

She keeps this approach simple and assumes that the reader knows nothing about mapping work processes. I like the lack of fluff and concise (if not terse) writing that is augmented by over 50 figures and illustrations.

If you want to learn how to map work processes this is the book with which to embark on your learning experience. I give it five stars for its clarity and completeness.

Rating:
Summary: Undergraduate Introductory Reference
Review: Very disappointing slim volume (81 pages) , that could do much much better.
Uses simplistic examples of the setting-out of dinner tables, filling automobile and getting dressed in the morning as the example base.
Little mention is made of changes required to style (swim lanes to include GUI interactions & handover) tie into UML Use Cases etc.
There is no reference to descriptive and emerging standards (UML type is NOT used) nor is any mention made of the various standards organisations.
There is little in the way of design approaches & simulation issues, change strategies, analysis of designs or implementation approach. No reference is made to modelling software and simulation tools.
No strategies are given for validation of the changes
There is little or no measurement of KPI's, costs and productivity / cost benefit analysis and practice.
No reference is made to sector best practice & the business patterns available.
No reference is made to workflow automation (internal & external), the software available and options approaches currently being used.
There are no Post Implementation Review (PIR) suggestions.
Basically unless you are a novice it is a complete waste of time and money.

Rating:
Summary: User Friendly Par Excellent!
Review: Viva la words! User friendly at its best. Can't put it down. I kept asking myself, "How can something so practical be so fun to process."

Rating:
Summary: Getting the basics right
Review: Within the first 2 pages of the workbook (the preface, mind you), I was very much behind Ms. Galloway and her approach to this technique. In other reviews you'll see criticism of the book for being seen as simplistic, but I think she strikes the right note. This is a simple, effective process and it's far better to learn to walk it before you start picking out your running shoes. Also, I would venture to guess that the majority of people who would benefit from using the process and would be asked to map a process never need to get much more complicated than the steps detailed in this workbook. Just because you can make a more complicated map doesn't always mean that you should. For people who can appreciate that sentiment, then this book is for you.

Also, the book receives criticism for using common/ordinary tasks such as filling your car with gasoline, but I think the author provides a very valid explanation for that approach. If she were to use a mock business scenario the temptation is to focus on what is going on in the scenario (is it the same as what we do or different?) rather than what is to be learned. This is sound education theory and it makes for a more intuitive learning process.