Once you have gone through the 10 steps to improve a business process, what should you do next? Should you immediately move on to the next challenge in your process inventory? Not if you want recognition for a job well done!
Taking time to summarize what you accomplished will help you to gain visibility in your organization. Gaining recognition though on improving a business process does not come as easy as getting a compliment on a new haircut or a new piece of clothing because the new process may not immediately stand out. You have to take some initiative to let management know what you have accomplished, and that becomes the challenge.
An executive summary is a tool you can use to present your work to senior management in the natural course of business without it looking as if you want a pat on the back. While executive summaries differ quite a bit, they should address whatever you identified as the main concerns when you began the improvement effort. Remember what caused you to start the improvement effort on a particular business process and start with a compelling statement that grabs the reader’s attention. The six sections of the executive summary include:
- Project focus
- Goals
- Summary
- Key findings
- Deliverables
- Appendix
Write your summary with the reader in mind and remember that not everyone will have the same level of understanding of the business process. In the project focus, lay out the business reason why you did the work (the business problem); in the goals, cover the key outcomes you hoped to achieve; in the summary, provide a high-level overview of the work and any analysis you completed; in the key findings, outline the discoveries you made along the way; in the deliverables, cover what information is available where; and include more detailed information in the appendix.
Including statistical information in the summary section will help position you as a business person and provide some thought-provoking data for management to consider.
Copyright 2010 Susan Page