=Paper=
{{Paper
|id=Vol-2074/article_4
|storemode=property
|title=Eliciting Employee & Customer Knowledge for Process Development and Optimization –
An Industry Case
|pdfUrl=https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-2074/article_4.pdf
|volume=Vol-2074
|authors=David Braunstein,Gabriela Pesch
}}
==Eliciting Employee & Customer Knowledge for Process Development and Optimization –
An Industry Case==
https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-2074/article_4.pdf
Eliciting Employee & Customer Knowledge for Process
Development and Optimization – An Industry Case
David Braunstein, Gabriela Pesch
DeepFinding SE
david.braunstein@deepfinding.com
gabriela.pesch@deepfinding.com
Abstract. Practical experiences from the field indicate that the development of
organizations is driven by implementing standardized process models. Although
these are well understood by IT experts and consultants, stakeholder knowledge
and needs are very likely disregarded in such approaches. However, there exist
methods and techniques allowing to elicit relevant implicit stakeholder
knowledge and transform it to process models, in order to get a grip on essential
assets of an organization. In the presented case study we demonstrate how to
overcome the aforementioned limitations in traditional development settings by
involving those in process design that are either actually performing tasks or in-
volved in their processing, namely employees and customers. The applied tech-
nique aims to tackle ‘blind spots’ of business operation, and collaboration of
stakeholder. Consequently, those who have to carry out operational processes
become informed to overview business operation and understand overarching
procedures (again). Besides bridging the gap between technical process design
and informal knowing, organizational learning towards collective resilient be-
havior can be triggered through continuous process development. Utilizing com-
puter-support for knowledge and business process management methods, agile
process design takes into account both, customer needs and experiential
knowledge of employees. Key is to network process-relevant knowledge across
departments and organizations.
Keywords: knowledge-driven BPM, implicit knowledge, knowledge elicita-
tion, mental models
1 Introduction
In many fields stakeholder knowledge is considered key to build up capacity or achieve
informed decision making (cf. [5] for recent findings). With respect to business process
development for the elicitation of knowledge, i.e. helping to make explicit
the knowledge concepts and reasoning requirements for successful business operation,
the involvement of stakeholders is considered essential [4]. Thereby, knowledge is elic-
ited to capture, store and deploy knowledge using IT to facilitate business processes in
the organization (cf. [9]). Elicitation of knowledge is central to Knowledge Manage-
ment aiming at creating, codifying and sharing valuable knowledge to the organization
2
[8]. Acquiring, organizing, and communicating both implicit and explicit knowledge of
employees so, that other employees may make use of it to be more effective and pro-
ductive in their work, includes capturing implicit knowledge. It is considered as indi-
vidual knowledge and needs to be converted to explicit knowledge, in order to improve
business operation. Hence, the most beneficiary from knowledge elicitation is business
process development and its implementation, e.g., through workflow management sys-
tems (cf. [1]).
This paper focuses on the incorporation of knowledge management into process de-
velopment and optimization by proposing a technique to enhance the process of elicit-
ing implicit work knowledge in the field of process engineering. We propose incorpo-
rating knowledge elicitation into business process management for the purpose of ex-
ternalizing implicit knowledge. The technique enables converting implicit to explicit
knowledge, allowing in a particular stage of organizational development to work with
implicit knowledge when it becomes explicit. It then can embodied in process repre-
sentations.
In this paper we present a corresponding case study. In section 2 we provide some
conceptual background on eliciting and externalization stakeholder knowledge for op-
erational use. In section 3 we introduce the case from industry and detail the starting
point and case objectives, namely, recognizing the time-criticality of tendering when
compared to competitors on the market. In section 4, we briefly introduce our frame of
operation. Although its focus is on knowledge elicitation, it targets grounding process
designs on externalized stakeholder knowledge in a transparent and traceable way. In
section 5, we introduce the structured procedure to externalize implicit stakeholder
knowledge and propagate it to organizational structures for further processing. Section
6 concludes the paper.
2 Externalization of Stakeholder Knowledge
Nonaka et al.'s knowledge management model [8] embodies the conversion of implicit
knowledge as part of organizational change, whereby Von Krogh et al. [7] have ex-
plored context and operational factors of generating knowledge for organizations. Of
particular importance is the involvement of stakeholders for externalizing organization-
relevant knowledge. This activity is part of several spiral stages of exploring the poten-
tial of change in an organization. The development process encompasses four modes,
termed as Socialization, Externalization, Combination, and Internalization (SECI).
Along socialization, implicit knowledge is exchanged between individuals mainly by
observation and imitation. Thereby, sharing experience, collaboration team, and direct
interaction are of crucial importance, while the externalization mode is more like a di-
alogue and finally, a collective reflection on work experience. It involves encoding im-
plicit knowledge in documents, data structures, or formal procedures.
One purpose of externalization is to articulate self-knowledge in terms of images,
ideas, and words. Another purpose is to elicit and transform implicit knowledge to un-
derstandable forms (explicit knowledge). Therefore, dialogue is a very important means
for both. Continuously, the combination mode reconfigures objects of explicit
3
knowledge through sorting, adding, and combining codified elements. This mode con-
cerns the transformation of explicit to explicit knowledge. Finally, in the internalization
mode stakeholders internalize explicit knowledge adapting their mental models by un-
derstanding and absorbing explicit knowledge to implicit knowledge. Individuals
achieve that largely by experience.
Implicit knowledge is considered as "hidden known" and difficult to articulate as it
resides in human’ brains. Consequently, organizational management as well as work
force and other stakeholders (customers, business partners etc.) need an effective
method in order to elicit relevant knowledge in a traceable and communicative way [3].
3 The Industry Case: Time-Critical Bidding
In our case study we refer to the offering process of an industrial company producing
large heating systems. Specifically, it concerns the maintenance and modernization of
existing plants. The trigger of organizational transformation have been critical inputs
by customers referring to the offering process. Customers have criticized the lengthy
bidding process – the addressed company (in the following we label the company A)
needs up to 12 weeks to come up with a tender, whereas its competitors place bids
within four weeks. In addition, management and employees of A have raised concerns
referring to the high demands on automation:
• Disruptive processes: IT and process consultants have created multi-part process
chains. They have developed process specifications for experts by experts. Employ-
ees could not identify themselves with the process definition because their know-
how had not been recognized and included.
• Lack of agile processes: Employees perceived weaknesses in the bidding process.
However, they did not communicate their findings because they did not feel they
could contribute to shaping and further developing the bidding process.
• Focus on IT-intensive process design: Company A had invested a lot of money and
effort in technology and applications in recent years. Although one of the objectives
has been to reduce the lead times of quoting and response times to customers, the
system developers focused on the data volume (BigData) rather than on the quality
of the data (DeepData). Once the data volume became the basis of each offering
case, they were core drivers of the throughput of the system. As a consequence, the
company could not reduce response times without further effort.
• Lack of participatory development: People were not involved in the development of
process designs. Their knowledge had not been considered or had got lost. Moreover,
the design of the offering process ignored interfaces relevant for coordination and
task completion.
• Lack of requirements engineering: Finally, the requirements of departments had not
been acquired and thus remained unknown. Since there had not been a structured
and adjusted collection of requirements, the bidding process had not been considered
as a whole so far. Therefore, the necessity and meaningfulness of coordination with
others had not become a development issue so far.
4
As this list of triggers for improving this business case reveals, several stakeholders are
involved in the bidding process. However, they neither have participated in a collabo-
rative development process so far, nor has their knowledge been acquired in a way they
themselves or their managers have been able to improve the organizational perfor-
mance. It would require aligned and mutually acknowledged process designs.
4 Operational Frame
In this section, we briefly introduce our framework we utilize when working with our
customers. We share with them the following question for developing their organiza-
tion of work:
• ‘How can organizational work processes be continuously developed and optimized
when recognizing the internal employee perspective on coordination while aligning
it with the (external) customer view and needs?’
To our experience, this question has turned out of particular importance, once
organizational development or transformation projects have been driven by IT
departments and/or consultants not familiar with the organizational situation at hand.
In order to use the experiential knowledge of customers and employees for process
development, a development technique should be able to uncover implicit knowledge,
since it strongly influences activities stakeholders perform along business processes.
Our approach aims to detect knowledge about process chains without pre-defined tech-
nical questions or specifying particular content topics. We rather develop relevant con-
tent by asking the participants to define scenarios by themselves including idealized
processes. These are scenarios they themselves are not aware of in the beginning of a
transformation project, as they use their implicit knowledge intuitively. As such, it is
not a self-evident part of conscious experience.
In order to know how processes can be developed and improved in a sustainable
way, we need to generate a comprehensive picture of the development situation. Even
when complex requirements are given, a structured representation of relevant items is
required to handle them in an organized way. It is the structured representation where
solutions can be located. Since customers and employees are relevant sources of both
information and innovation, we always incorporate the market and organizational view
of processes into the development and optimization process. We frame each case ac-
cording to the nested structure shown in Fig. 1.
5
Fig. 1. Operational frame: Implicit knowledge propagating to collective knowledge
The frame of operation represents a continuum of knowledge states:
• Implicit knowledge forms the basis for perceptions and decisions. It essentially
shapes corporate culture and corporate success. Employees tend to use their experi-
ence in work processes in increasingly automated and thus barely reflective ways.
Although implicit knowledge is guiding people's actions, at the same time, it is
mostly unconscious and used intuitively. People only have minimal immediate ac-
cess to it. We aim making this knowledge accessible for organizations.
• Use of language. Language is per se ambiguous. Meaning conveyed by language
comes into being once humans pass on verbal statements. For instance, only by hav-
ing a common understanding of the entire bidding process, employees are able to
communicate with other departments and develop the process further. We need to
utilize certain mechanisms to bring the language code to the surface according to the
specific corporate culture where it is used. Then, cultural factors or aspects become
visible and can be shared for further processing.
• Ideal conceptions and future expectations trigger changing perspectives of the
stakeholder (groups) involved. In many cases, causal thinking needs to get inter-
rupted, to allow for innovative ideas to emerge from currently perceiving the organ-
ization and its environment. We target changing perspectives in a structured while
open process. It aims capturing both, working, and envisioned scenarios as perceived
by interviewed stakeholders.
• Measurement and rating: Mostly, organizations work with KPIs referring to the
past rather than providing a picture of the current situation or envisioning transfor-
6
mation. Why not allow involved stakeholder groups to rate statements from inter-
views completely by themselves? Future expectations and ideal conceptions can then
be integrated in the rating. Thus, the individual relevance of topics becomes trans-
parent and concrete to be shared.
• Options for action need to be developed and formulated by those (groups of) stake-
holders that are actually involved in a business case. They should not be generated
from sources external to the organization, in particular when aiming to achieve col-
lective acceptance for a business process. They should rather stem from concerned
stakeholders interested in active management of change and envisioning future sce-
narios and work processes.
• Collective knowledge: The frame of operation allows grasping the collective
memory of an organization and its environment. It consists of qualitative and quan-
titative information, implicit knowledge, use of language, ideal conceptions, options
for action, and finally, degrees of fulfillment which can be calculated on the basis of
the ratings. The resulting findings ensures organizations to decide upon transfor-
mation adequate to the situation of an organization at hand, as the elicited data stem
from their stakeholders, and thus correspond to the opportunities they consider rele-
vant for the organization’s development.
The continuum, when described as nested structure, shows as core concept of the ap-
proach implicit knowledge. Like using an inverse cone, it allows bootstrapping infor-
mation, communicating, and finally sharing potentials of change.
5 Procedure
In this section, we introduce the structured procedure we follow when eliciting implicit
knowledge and successively processing and enriching it. It enables generating business
processes specifications considered valid for the involved stakeholders. These specifi-
cations correspond to the current organizational capability revealed by the elicitation
procedure and subsequent calculations.
In order to demonstrate the approach, we use the industrial case as introduced in
section 3. The customer, company A, is an industrial manufacturer of complex heating
systems. They are used in large and major buildings. At the manufacturer plants’ 80%
of the parts are self-produced and 20% of those are purchased. Customers of A are
companies that operate large warehouses, industrial plants, office buildings, or hospi-
tals. Company A has specialized in supporting the operation of newly constructed
plants as well as modernized ones. Our case concerns bids ranging from preparing
maintenance to modernizing existing plants. Although for most of the tasks the com-
pany employs technicians, it also employ many non-technicians in the field. In order to
optimize sales and to enhance the retrogressive sales figures, the sales process of the
company needed to be evaluated first and foremost from an internal (employee) and
external (customer) point of view.
In order to develop a complete (knowledge) picture of the situation, each of our pro-
jects follows several sequential stages:
7
1. Goal setting workshop
2. Case design
3. Knowledge externalization
4. Group analysis
5. Presentation of results
6. Prioritization and transfer workshop
7. Evaluation
We describe each of them in detail in the following.
5.1 Goal setting workshop
The starting point of the technique is a workshop in which solution-focused, systemic
questions are used to scope the development project and detail the project objectives in
terms of work tasks with the company. In our case, company A wanted to better service
their customers with existing heating systems because they had already lost many cus-
tomers to competitors in this segment due to the lack of service quality. In order to
scrutinize the task from an internal point of view, all involved stakeholders clarify what
is going well in bidding processes and should therefore be maintained in the future, and
what should be improved. Since systemic questions can also trigger a change of per-
spective, the workshop participants are motivated to develop conceptions about ideal
work processes.
The result of the workshop is a formulation of a common project goal of the com-
pany’s project team, in our case company’s A project team:
• Longer life for existing facilities for our customers
According to the workshop participants, this goal needs to be considered in relation to
─ Optimization of the bidding process
─ Increase of quality of service
─ Efficiency in modernization
─ Innovation
─ Digital services
The results of the workshop provide the input for the next step.
5.2 Case design
Based on the goal setting workshop, the design for further examination is individually
tailored to the topic. Conventional information retrieval tools, such as interview ques-
tionnaires or interview guides, use questions to deepen the topic. We have discovered
that questions directly referring to work content and organizational structures are not
appropriate to get in-depth information about work processes in companies. Questions
or analysis guides are always based on (implicit) hypotheses, and thus predisposition
the frame in which respondents have to answer and develop ideas for improvement.
8
Thereby, it restricts the set of options for answering, and is likely to exclude all other
subject matters in the context of each item.
In contrast to existing questionnaires or interview techniques, we map the object of
investigation to so-called carriers of meaning. They constitute anchors or points of ref-
erence for eliciting work knowledge. They form some structural language because they
merely represent a framework without predetermining or specifying any problem- or
solution-relevant content. In our case study, the following carriers of meaning could be
identified for further eliciting knowledge about work processes:
• "Work process currently" anchors how a work process is currently perceived by em-
ployees
• "Work process in three years" highlights the expectations of employees when opti-
mizing the work process in three years
• "Ideal work process" forms the baseline how the employees would describe the pro-
cess from an ideal perspective
• "Innovation in the enterprise today" anchors how innovation is perceived today in
the organization
• "Innovation in the enterprise ideal" refers to how the organization ideally should
innovate
• "Digitization in the organization today" means how digitization is currently per-
ceived in the organization
• "Digitization in the organization ideally" means how digitization should occur in an
ideal case in the organization
After successfully testing the design of the case at hand with stakeholders, appoint-
ments are arranged with a selected group of people that will be interviewed (see section
on knowledge externalization). They stem from different stakeholder groups and are
employees, leaders, management, or customers.
5.3 Knowledge externalization
The interlocutors (executives, employees, or customers of company A) now all go
through the same inquiry process several times. This cycle of drawing distinctions to
evaluation is repeated in an interview between 6-8 times until all aspects relevant to the
interlocutor are expressed about the topic. The special process prevents from an inten-
tionally rational distortion when eliciting their knowledge. In this way, respondents
should be enabled to rely exclusively on their intuition, even given a large number of
individual decisions (selecting a carrier of meaning out of three choices, and rating on
a scale). Each cycle of the procedure follows a specific sequence of steps:
• Draw distinctions by identifying specific properties of a carrier of meaning
• Formulate construct, i.e. labeling a property
• Clarify language usage, i.e. ascertain meaning to a statement
• Develop ideal conception
• Formulate options for action
• Assessment of relevance
9
We detail the line of activities in the following.
3.3.1 Draw distinctions
In our technique, people's ability to draw distinctions is at the center of information
gathering. It relies on the recognized and scientifically applied technique of George A.
Kelly [6] and has been extended by a methodological frame, in particular for structuring
the results and in this way, creating insight for context-sensitive organizational devel-
opment. Due to its nature, the elicitation procedure overcomes pre-determined options
of answering. It rather offers subjective freedom, a direct access to language, and gives
space for articulating implicit knowledge. It enables other persons to access individual
and previously not uttered experiences by means of common communication, i.e. nat-
ural language. The approach originates from the repertory-grid method that is highly
accepted by interlocutors (see [14]). It is an effective method to collect implicit
knowledge, and widely used in knowledge management projects (see [11]).
Drawing distinctions triggers a deep reflection process making implicit knowledge
accessible for organizations. We use a software system supporting the elicitation cycles.
The software randomly selects three elements from a set of 10-15 carriers of meaning.
The interlocutor draws a distinction identifying a certain difference. A triad may read
as follows:
• There are the following three carriers of meaning:
o "Work process currently"
o "Work process in 3 years"
o "Innovation in the company today"
The task of the respondent is now to make a distinction, instructing the respondent as
follows:
• Which two of these three carriers of meaning are similar and thus, different from the
third, in relation to the work processes in your company?
The interlocutor now intuitively makes a complex decision. For instance, "Work pro-
cess currently" and "Work process in 3 years" are similar for the respondent.
3.3.2 Formulate a construct
The interlocutor now describes the commonality of the two carriers of meaning in
the form of a property term or a short sentence. For instance, the commonality he iden-
tifies is "complicated". The term is documented for further rating.
Since people think and decide in opposites, e.g., ‘high’ versus ‘low’, the opposite of
the term is elicited from the participant in the course of the interview:
• What do you consider the opposite of "complicated" in terms of the work processes
in your company?
In our sample case the answer is "structured". Hence, for the construct “complicated”
the individual opposite is “structured”. It is termed contrast and documented, too.
10
This contrast does not have to be the semantic opposite as generally acknowledged,
it rather expresses how the interlocutor describes the opposite according to his/her in-
dividual mindset. We guide the interlocutor to change perspective. Thereby, not only
the semantic opposite of the term is of interest, but actually taking a position in which
a completely different state than the one described with "complicated" is experienced.
The interlocutor needs to feel the opposite before expressing it in verbal terms.
We also use systemic gestures in that context. They enable the interlocutor to artic-
ulate new and previously unutterable knowledge. Accordingly, knowledge is external-
ized in a transverbal language. It supplements purely verbal language as it points out
content which could not have been talked about in verbal language before the natural
language utterance.
3.3.3 Clarify language usage and meaning
Since language utterances can be ambiguous, we need to clarify concepts until the
meaning has been clarified and becomes understandable. Then, the addressed concepts
and their use can be described in terms of observable actions. In this way, we are able
to feed back to an organization how language is actually used within the organization,
and when having contact to external partners and customers. Another effect of this kind
of elicitation is that a common language can be developed for the organization. For
instance, we could clarify what the construct "complicated” versus the contrast “struc-
tured" actually means for the involved stakeholders in terms of work processes. Sample
explanations were:
• “By “complex” I mean the complexity of our quotation process - it is too restrictive.
We cannot talk to our internal technicians because our ticket system does not allow
this. Only when the topic is resolved can we trigger a ticket. Otherwise, the meeting
goes on our cost center, but in order to speak I must first clarify with the technology
what it's all about because then I can formulate a request to the technology
department.”
• ”“Structured “means we have a clearer process in the quoting process. We know,
as soon as the customer has made a request, that we can join forces with the
technology department without having to take account internal cost centers. We thus
clarify the topic in the interests of the customer, saving a lot of time due to the
iterations that we now have to go through in the process. As a result, the reaction
time for the customer is much shorter.”
We ask each stakeholder to explain each construct and contrast, in order to reveal
commonalities and differences with respect to the use and meaning of qualifying terms.
They influence work processes of organization in many cases.
3.3.4 Formulate ideal conceptions and develop transversal competencies
Transversal skills or transferable skills are all those skills that have been acquired in
a specific context or when managing a specific situation, and can be transferred to other
situations and/or to a different context [12] - see also the KeySTART2Work Project on
transversal competences which is funded by the European Commission [2]. We work
11
with systemic coaching interventions to identify them. They facilitate developing ide-
alized processes with interlocutors according to their personal view.
When describing what an ideal process looks like, interlocutors also clarify their own
contribution to a specific work process. Thereby, one becomes aware of one´s own
contribution and the ability to make this contribution. Both can be articulated in the
course of the intervention process. For instance, the ideal work process could look like
that:
• “I work in a network with other departments, we have all the customer requirements
in mind and we are committed to bringing the offer to the customer quickly (in two
weeks). My personal contribution is that I enter into the CRM system any data about
existing heating systems that already are available in the house, or I appoint someone
to do so. This speeds up the process enormously because the local sales department
immediately has all the data about the existing heating system available.”
Hence, the ideal conception of work tasks allow establishing points of reference when
evaluating current situations. They allow the interlocutors and others expressing an op-
timal case or properties they would like to achieve with respect to social constellations,
work procedures, as well as products and their development.
3.3.5 Develop options for action
Based on the existing process of creating offers, the respondents develop options for
action. In our sample case, they were adjusted along a three-partite time line: currently,
in 3 years, and ideally:
• "Work process currently": an obstacle is the ticket system - technology hinders to
preliminary talk about the bidding
• "Work process in 3 years": Cost savings have been achieved without tickets,
because the offer goes much earlier and without feedback to the customer. Questions
can be clarified quickly.
• "Ideal work process": teams from sales and technology are networked, data from
existing systems are in the CRM system to support local sales. Offer lead time is two
weeks.
Structuring the timeline facilitates to design specific interventions that could fit to an
organization’s status. For instance, adapting existing support technology might be a
matter of months, whereas changing the willingness to cooperate might require several
elicitation steps before re-designing and implementing modifications.
3.3.6 Assessment of relevance
Within the term dimensions (constructs and contrasts) as developed by the respond-
ents, e.g., "complicated" versus "structured", a specific scale is applied for rating. We
use a 6-part scale. Then, each carrier of meaning is rated according to the scale, again,
featuring intuitively judgements by the interlocutor within these terms. The scale does
not show real numbers, as it is not about giving grades, but are rather markers, as the
carriers of meaning should be intuitively ranked with regard to proximity or distance to
12
one of the terms. This assessment reveals the relevance of topics and is part of preparing
the data for a mathematical, statistical analysis.
Fig. 2. Structure and procedural scheme of a case
Fig. 2 shows the structure of the elicitation scheme and procedure followed so far. Each
statement of interlocutors is bound to a carrier of meaning. Hence, the initial step is
crucial for creating meaningful results. Carriers of meaning need to represent items that
both,
• interlocutors are familiar with, and
• have a close semantic distance to the topic to be addressed in the course of acquiring
knowledge.
The triadic selection scheme facilitates binding of distinctive properties that are char-
acteristic of the carriers of meaning and allow for further elaboration. The latter is of
eminent importance
• not only to understand the existing perception of a situation or a process,
• but rather to describe an ideal situation or process in terms of clarified labels and
elaborated ratings.
Therefore, we also collect all original statements provided by interviewees. They enable
identification of meanings and allow tracing back the elicitation process to the individ-
ual context of the structured raw data.
13
5.4 Group analysis
At a first glance, the technique seems to be based on a qualitative approach. However,
we have developed specific procedures and algorithms. They allow several hundred
individual interviews to be combined mathematically and statistically into a group anal-
ysis. The analysis can be both qualitative and quantitative, including statistical multi-
variate methods, multidimensional scaling, principal component analysis, and a spe-
cific algorithm.
The construct or component space can be used to identify the terms (constructs)
relevant to a topic (carriers of meaning) (association measures). The meaning of the
elicited terms is clarified and deepened by the qualitative information (original state-
ments), and annotated to the terms (qualitative evaluation). In addition, the distances
between carriers of meaning and constructs are determined in the construct or compo-
nent space according to [13]. These distances can be used to quantitatively describe the
similarity or dissimilarity of a meaning carrier X currently has compared to a meaning
carrier X in an ideal case, e.g., through degrees of fulfillment.
In terms of reliability and validity, there are various sources of evidence: With regard
to the patterns of meaning carriers, e.g., Sperlinger [10] demonstrated a retest reliability
of 0.95. Previous empirical research proves the outstanding effectiveness of the basic
principle of Kelly [6]. Relevant deviations from the results or serious contradictions to
parallel comparative measurements with standardized questionnaires and other meth-
ods have not yet been determined.
Fig. 3. Sample presentation of results
Figure 3 shows a sample presentation of results. It is composed of an animated concept
map conveying a bird’s-eye-view on the elicited constructs and contrasts. In addition
to the items, original statements are presented indicating the frequency of terms and
statements. Besides overviewing, the measurement of acquired soft factors, the elicited
14
options for action are detailed as process specifications through role-specific task flow
diagrams (right side of the figure).
5.5 Results
We present the results in form of various charts and evaluation methods. They are a
way to visualize the differences in the processes TODAY, OUGHT-TO-BE, and
IDEAL. Here are some key findings of the case, encoding the PROCESSES TODAY
in the way the interlocutors have described them along the elicitation.
They could identify four most dominant problems:
1) The sales department has little know-how how to collect the data needed for the
working processes on the construction.
2) Lack of technical equipment for putting in the data on their occurrence into the
IT-system.
3) No freely available data sources that could be used, although they exist in the
company.
4) Queries cannot be repeated when running the offering process. That is the rea-
son why many iterations of process steps occur, involving sales and the technol-
ogy department, which finally lead to a time loss.
We let the customers draw a picture of their IDEAL offering process.
The customers described an ideal offering process especially with fast feedback on a
request or inquiry offer period. It needs to be limited to four weeks.
They captured the ideal offering process as follows:
1. On-going communication on technical issues must take place without waiting times
- there are enormous costs and problems when the system has to be shut down.
2. Silo thinking in terms of departments should give way to networked thinking.
3. Agile development and ongoing optimization of processes strengthen personal
responsibility of executive employees.
4. Optimize work processes based on customer requirements.
5. Covering all plants in the Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system, so
that sales can get access and use the data.
6. Technical equipment for the complimenting elicitation of data, i.e. a helmet with
Google-glasses. In this way, the technology department should provide sales
support on-site.
7. Tablets for connecting to the company’s server, in order to complete missing data
directly at the customer’s location.
8. Networking the company’s sales and technology departments from the start to
create a personal exchange between the co-workers.
9. A common development of the offer including sales and technology for answering
customer questions on the spot. Technology is provided so that co-workers can
connect via teleconference.
10. After delivering the offer acceptance, sales department should inform the project
leader once every month.
15
After completion of the order by the customer, sales continues to be responsible for the
project and is in charge of the communication between customer, technology, and other
departments. In doing so, however, sales is referred to as project management instead
of sales. Since sales people are not technologically skilled, the project manager can
invite the technology department to the quarterly meetings that take place on the con-
struction site. Since such commitments can be time-consuming, the project manager
may connect the technology department via teleconferencing to the meeting on the con-
struction site.
The IT-department teamed up with the internal quality management to create the
OUGHT-TO-BE process regarding the development of an offer. The results have been
presented in different charts and evaluation sheets. When focusing on the case, the offer
preparation process has been detailed. Fig. 4 puts the target, current, and envisioned
IDEAL process specification into mutual context.
Fig. 4. Sample results encoded in process specifications
Once this step has been reached a roll-out for the organization can be planned, however
taking into account the organization’s structural, human resource, and technical capa-
bilities.
5.6 Prioritization and transfer workshop
One week to a maximum of one month after the presentation of the results, the options
for action are worked on in a workshop together with the company’s team. In the work-
shop the company completes the list of options for action before rating them. The result
is a four-field matrix, which sheds light on the question which topics should be imple-
mented urgently, and less urgently, from an internal point of view. In our case study,
concrete solutions were found to improve the offer generation process, which could
also be implemented in a straightforward way.
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Fig. 5. Snapshots from a transfer workshop
Fig. 5 exemplifies data from running the transfer workshop. There may be several per-
spectives on the elicited knowledge that are of interest for different organizational units
or projects.
5.7 Evaluation of change
Agile process development means the continuous coordination of the knowledge of all
stakeholders being involved in a process. Both, the customer view, and the internal
view provide information about optimization opportunities. This information about
processes form the basis for the development of a big ‘knowledge’ picture, as it refers
to multiple points in time, i.e. intervals of 9-12 months. Along this path, a company has
the possibility to adjust processes continuously, and to create a learning process that
incorporates both, the implicit knowledge components from different perspectives, the
transverbal knowledge, and the transversal competencies of the parties involved in the
process.
Fig. 6 depicts the resulting spiral process with respect to the agility and resilience of
a developing organization.
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Fig. 6. Spiral development triggered by repetitive elicitation and development cycles
6 Conclusions
Markets and thus, organizations are continuously changing. Stakeholder knowledge in-
creasingly becomes an essential asset to adapt to novel situations. In particular, implicit
knowledge is key for operational process designs. We have developed and demon-
strated a technique allowing organizations to elicit relevant implicit stakeholder
knowledge and transform it to process models in a transparent and structured way. The
presented case study exemplified for a bidding process how to identify stakeholder
needs for developing and optimizing business processes while overcoming experienced
deficiencies. The underlying question of such endeavors is
• “How can organizational work processes continuously be developed and optimized
on the basis of the internal employee perspective aligned with the external customer
view and customer needs?”
The case and development procedure showed the structured transformation based on
an elicitation step addressing both, the internal employee view, and the external cus-
tomer views revealing customer needs (in our example regarding the bidding process).
According to the achieved results, the involved stakeholder groups could develop
their picture of an ideal bidding process and could compare it to the way they perceived
it at the time being. They also developed options for action to bridge the gap between
the current situation (as they perceive it), and how they envision the future process. In
doing so, they used their implicit knowledge and process experience they had not artic-
ulated so far. By gaining deep and contextual knowledge on the offer generation pro-
cess, the company could introduce significant changes on organizing work tasks, and
thus, bridge the gap between the formal and informal offering process.
The most significant changes were:
18
• Anticipate customer needs: The company developed innovations based on the
customer feedback on the processes developed and, most important, they developed
processes that could anticipate customer needs – they could evaluate the data from
digitally networked heating systems already before the customer could become
beware of it.
• Proactive Offerings: Services were developed and proactively offered to customers.
The customers were able to optimize their own work process by this approach
without external intervention.
• Recognition of implicit knowledge: Employees have experiences that they
normally cannot verbalize but that are relevant to process optimization. By becoming
aware of their own implicit abilities they provided essential input to be able to
quickly optimize the offering process. The most important change was the
combination of previously separated work steps. They were composed in a way that
sales, technology and technology work force coordinate themselves to act as a team,
and jointly present offers to the customer. This step resulted in significant savings
because questions that previously had to be clarified through many iterative process
steps did not occur any more.
• Promotion of self-responsibility: Self-responsibility for processes is encouraged
when employees understand the overall process and is of benefit for both, the
organization, and the customer. The project and interventions qualified employees
to reflect on processes thoroughly, and bring in their skills and perspective for
change management. In this way, they became involved by individual engagement,
and started identifying themselves with the bidding process. They took responsibility
for the process design, and met each other regularly to discuss and implement minor
optimizations. Finally, the company has managed to shift from managing isolated
departments to a unified network of thinkers and acting stakeholders. Now, company
A understands process chains as a single entity. Both, experiences and knowledge
are shared and circulate within the entire organization.
• Agile development of processes: Resilience through agile process management has
been enabled due to the employees’ constantly reporting of failures and deviations
from the idealized process. The organization is now on its way to becoming agile in
terms of its corporate culture.
Overall, it seems the well-prepared elicitation and acquisition procedure pays off cre-
ating opportunities, even in times of less process agility, or increased pressure to inno-
vate and re-organize.
19
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