Operational Excellence
Contents: contrary to common belief operational excellence is closely related to innovation, both as to radical renewal (business process re-engineering) and as to continuous improvement. Operational excellence deals with brilliantly functioning transformation processes and therefore requires in each case a process approach.
Operational excellence deals with the entire chain of values. The era of reorganizations with companies on the brink of bankruptcy is over. Operational excellence is aimed at maximising operationally added values with regard to processes and operational systems within the entire chain of values. Since the life cycles of technologies, systems and products become increasingly shorter and growth curves increasingly sharper, technologies which make technologies, processes and systems profitable on the shorter term must be developed. To this end, excellent processes and systems are essential. A crucial aspect of operational excellence today is therefore the ability to rapidly implement new systems and new products into an operationally excellent environment.
This primarily concerns optimising any and all transformation processes in such a way that all market demands (which can vary) are met: in an innovative, fast, reliable and cheap way. It not only concerns to be able to anticipate discontinuity and other opportunities in a fast, reliable and cheap manner. Moreover, operational excellence not only applies to one segment of a life cycle but matters during the entire life cycle.
Objective: implementing and/or improving operational excellence.
Target audience: large and small organizations which want to implement continuous improvement in a structural manner and are willing to involve any and all relevant stakeholders.
Issues: LEAN-thinking, TPM, Six Sigma’s, (pre)conditions for the implementation of operational excellence.
Out of the ordinary: a fitting organizational structure constitutes a condition.