This morning I attended an awesome discussion from Pat Bleasdale, AVP at Wilmington Trust, entitled Drowning in Swim Lanes? A Process Model Can Help.

Her piece of advice was to utilize process models before moving into swim lanes. According to Pat, working with a model provides the sponsors with a view of the process steps in a more familiar context that makes sense to them from the very beginning.

Pat said that a great piece of advice to remember is that “the tools don’t rule you, you rule the tools.” In other words, just because you can use a swim lane right off the bat, does not mean that you have to use it right away.  

Ask the sponsors the magic question – “What do you have that already exists?” Usually this will spark an “aha moment” and they will produce a wealth of valuable process information that they already have on hand like written policies and procedures, spreadsheets, and sometimes even workflows that you can use to create the basic process model.

Also make sure that you interview all sponsors to determine what it is that they do every day from their perspective, and make sure that you observe the work so that you have a more complete understanding of the atmosphere, attitudes and aptitudes involved.  Sometimes these things can open up the conversation to determine how to better perform the process, or where disagreements exist.

Once you have this basic process model you can use it to determine “what do we need to make this work,” and “how would this process look if it were totally built out and perfected?” Additionally you can use the model for phasing, scoping, keeping sponsors engaged, status reporting and project planning.

After creating the model and having the sponsors on board you can then move into using swim lanes – this time with a more advanced understanding of how the process will actually flow, with better sponsor buy-in, and greater direction.

These things will help you avoid the dreaded moment when you launch the process and the sponsors say, “That’s not how we do it” – or, as Pat calls it “the day of unpleasant surprises.”

Happy modeling everyone!

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