When a customer asks to see your Quality Manual or even a specific process, do you cringe? Do you have anything in place to show your customers how you develop your product or what the steps are in delivering your service? Are you considering ISO certification but have no idea where to start? Does the whole idea of documenting your process in a way that you're willing to let your customers see seem overwhelming? Here's an easy way to get your documentation started.
It relies on the process owners - your subject matter experts - the people who are responsible for completing any given task.
It won't add to the things you're already juggling until the final steps when decisions have to be made.
1.
Start by having each process owner write down what they're doing now.
Be sure they know there's no right or wrong way to do the job or the write-up.
So far, they've been getting the job done one way or another.
That one way or another leads to problems with consistent quality and consistent quality can be the first step to satisfying and even delighting customers.
This is a starting place.
Make sure that each process owner knows that "quick and dirty" is what you're looking for.
You're not giving them an assignment that prevents them from doing their other work for more than minutes.
2.
Give a copy of each write-up to the process owner whose process precedes the writer's process.
Give another copy to the process owner who receives the end product from the writer.
Both of these people can see overlaps and gaps.
They can look at the process with a different point of view.
While the before and after process owners look at the step between them, they are finding opportunities to fill gaps and balance the work load.
At the same time, the original writer is looking at processes they feed into and follow.
Each person is contributing to the improvement of the first batch of write-ups.
3.
Once the write-ups have been edited by the previous and following process owners, you'll look at the results.
If you have more than one person doing a task and get more than one version, that's a good thing.
It uncovers a quality issue and gives you the information you need to define a uniform process from the differing starting places.
If only one person is doing the job and there are places where you can see gaps, you have the opportunity to fill the gap and eliminate potential problems.
If any of the process owners hit a point of confusion, it requires your attention.
Observe the process in the write-up and make your decisions.
Conclusion: Start by having your process owners, the subject matter experts, draft your documentation and take a step by step approach to developing the clear, concise communication that your customers want to see.