You don't have to run faster, if you don't have to run at all
How Journey Management helps us run our Operations
You know you are doing something well, according to some smart people, when you get invited to speak at a conference with people in the audience who have run around the block a time or two.. or three.
You also know you are doing something well, according to our AI overlords, when the transcript from the talk changes your name from Vess Clewley to “Best Clearly".” I’ll take it! 🤣
This post is about that talk. I had the pleasure to showcase an example of how the Journey Management method helps me run Ops in my daily life. For the full talk you can head here. If you don’t have the time (35min!) here is an edited summary.
Cut to the chase. Gimme the one Sentence Summary: The talk emphasises the effective application of Journey Management to business operations.
Why It Matters: Understanding and optimising operational journeys can lead to significant time / cost savings, and better clarity on cross-functional priorities. In an environment in which we have to Do More With Less for Longer, it is a viable way to build a Resilient Organisation.
What is it: Journey Management is the practice of mapping and organising journeys in a way that you can make customer-centric business decisions. In this context, I explore the Quote-to-Cash journey, detailing the steps from creating a quote to receiving payment. The “customers” are the internal team.
How to do it:
Mapping the Journey: Begin by mapping out the entire process, detailing every step for every involved party.
Identifying Pain Points: Highlight areas of friction or inefficiency in the journey.
Validation of Assumptions: Validate assumptions about each step, confirming what works and what doesn't.
Craft Opportunities: Focusing on the validated pain points, formulate the problems (= Opportunities) you can solve for.
Prioritisation: Using the Opportunity matrix, prioritise Opportunities based on their value to the customer and the business.
Brainstorm Solutions: For the identified top Opportunities, brainstorm potential solutions.
Implementation: Implement the solutions, starting with those that offer relief to the Opportunities with the highest value.
Review and Iterate: Continuously review the journey, updating and optimizing as necessary.
In the example I gave, we get 4 Opportunities in that one single Journey. We saw that some of those are relevant to other teams’ journeys. And as such emerge as more pressing than the rest. We didn’t go and solve all 4. We solved 2. And we were very clear which 1 we would start with.
By following this approach, as a business we streamline our operations, ensuring we’re delivering maximum value while operating efficiently. For real. And instead of running fast, we don’t run at all. This is why I sat down :)
As always, to continue the conversation, connect with me here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vessclewley/
Also, we are hiring! If you have experience working in RevOps, or a function which taught you about Salesforce, Tableu, PowerBI and similar tools, drop you CV. The good thing is, you get work on some super cool BizOps projects. The not so good things is, you get to put up with me ;)