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Strategy Spotlight: 5 Business Process Maturity Levels for Your Evolutionary Success

Every organization, be it a group of people, a community, a military unit, a government body, a manufacturing company or service company, is at a different level of maturity when it comes to process and productivity.

There are maturity process levels that exist in every business, just as there is a need to be lean. It’s all part of the natural business evolution. Every business and department evolves along certain maturity levels either organically or intentionally. It’s also common to become stuck in one place along the maturity continuum.

To begin the strategic planning around process and productivity, your team will need to assess your business’s level of maturity. Consider these five evolution maturity levels:

  1. Chaotic: no real structure – everything is at the 11th hour
  2. Reactive: all last minute – plan is open – when the leadership says jump, the team says how high
  3. Proactive: repeatable processes in place – managing efficiency, but not business needs
  4. Service: semi-integrated processes – able to measure business economics
  5. Value: connected processes – measured and shared

Related Article: 5 Really Good Reasons to Map Business Processes

What is your business maturity level, not only for the organization as a whole, but also its various departments? What are all your business processes? In what way does your maturity process level(s) impact your business productivity? What level of maturity do you want to be at (or need to be at)? By when can you achieve that maturity level?

These questions will help you determine your present business process maturity level(s) and your future desired maturity state. They create dialogue among your people on what improvements need to be made and the commitment it will take to make them happen. Once you’ve thoroughly explored these questions, add into the conversation the need to be a lean business environment, one where value for the end customer is considered and you now have a recipe to recreate your business process and production best practice.

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