Enhancing Operational Efficiency with the City Map technique

Before automating a process, you need to see it clearly. The City Map technique gives your organisation a three-layer visual overview of business activities, departmental workflows, and individual process steps. That way you can pinpoint exactly where automation will deliver the highest return.

Understanding the City Map Technique

The City Map technique, much like a multi-layered city plan, allows businesses to visualise and understand their operational landscape in three significant layers:

1. The Business Layer:

Inspired by the Porter Value Chain Model, this first layer provides a macro view of your business activities. Porter’s model divides business activities into primary (like operations, logistics, and sales) and support activities (including technology development and HR).

For instance, in a retail business, the primary activities include the procurement of goods, inventory management, and sales, while support activities might involve managing the supply chain software and training sales staff.

This layer helps in identifying where your business adds value and where HyperAutomation can enhance these value-adding activities. Learn more about the Hyperfox Order App.

2. The Application Layer:

Here, we map all the applications used across the organisation. In a service department, this might include a helpdesk system. In sales and marketing, it could be the CRM software and e-commerce platforms.

By identifying these applications, companies can pinpoint where their data comes from and how it flows, which is crucial for effective automation.

3. The Process Layer:

This involves mapping the actual business processes. For example, in customer service, processes like handling customer inquiries and managing warranties are charted.

Understanding these processes in detail can reveal gaps and inefficiencies ready for automation.

Creating an Overview for HyperAutomation

The beauty of the City Map technique lies in its ability to provide a comprehensive view of an organisation's potential for HyperAutomation.

By aligning the business, application, and process layers, companies can have a clear picture of where to start with automation. This approach goes beyond core process improvement; it fosters a culture of continuous innovation and strategic automation.

Mapping these processes gives clear insights into the as-is situation, helps to detect bottlenecks - often on transition situations - and thus where we at Hyperfox focus to make possible optimisations.

The big lesson from this exercise is mainly that we work in islands that do not communicate with each other in a streamlined way. Detecting those islands, identifying the information flows and analysing what needs to be communicated is actually part of that HyperAutomation journey.

Conclusion

The City Map technique isn't just a mapping tool; it's a strategic starting point for businesses embarking on the journey of HyperAutomation.

By dissecting and understanding the different layers of an organisation, necessary to understand business information flows, companies can identify key areas for improvement and automation, ensuring that their journey towards digital transformation is both effective and efficient.

Explore HyperAutomation with Hyperfox

Discover how the City Map technique can revolutionise your approach to business process automation. Contact us today to explore the potential of HyperAutomation in your operations.

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