Businesses that grow and record massive profits do not stand still. The process of growth and efficient development is characterized by continuous improvement in all, or at least, the key areas. Nonetheless, continuous improvement is itself impossible without a constant, close examination of your business value. This is where value stream mapping is vital. Value stream mapping (VSM for short) is a simple way of analyzing the current value delivery models to customers and designing newer ways to improve the delivery more efficiently. Simply put, it is the reduction of unnecessary costs while improving the way customers are satisfied.
Major Benefits of Value Stream Mapping
VSM remains one of the most essential and significant aspects of business development. As a tool, it is unrivaled in its benefit of providing value for a simple process. As more businesses are under pressure to perform better and drive more value, the challenge to scale the delivery of software service and improve customer experience is made easier through the deployment of value stream mapping.
The following are the key areas your business could see improvement through VSM:
1. Clarity of processes:
Sometimes, your business may experience a slight but impactful change in the business procedure. Such change may begin as a harmless and unnoticed trend, but value stream mapping could help you see this immediately it begins. Streamlining the production and delivery process allows you to see each trend from every angle and make the best decisions.
2. Waste reduction:
Since the goal is to increase efficiency to the maximum, VSM will help you identify the areas where time and effort are wasted. Customer experience might not be directly affected by unnecessary efforts spent on your part, but over time, the impact will be seen in unnecessary costs and unproductive processes. Now you know where to minor on, and where to major on.
3. Mine actionable data and feedback:
With VSM, your team can easily mine data that is both actionable and directive. VSM evaluated the people, tools, and processes involved in product delivery and can quickly identify and collect data from each component. This data can then be processed to get information that will influence further decisions.
4. Stay ahead of customers:
Many people do not realize that VSM helps businesses to stay ahead of customers. In fact, this predictive advantage of VSM is grossly unexplored. By drawing a map of product delivery while taking short and long term customer trend patterns into consideration, you can easily predict where and how customers will respond best to your product. The bottom line is, you know just ‘how’ the ‘where’ and ‘how’ to make profits!
5. Evaluate current state:
VSM can help you determine how your work processes currently exist. The insights drawn will help you determine the next course of action for the next phase and plan.
Value stream mapping is a representation of how your business delivers. Learning to perform a simple VSM will significantly improve your business insights.
