How to Do Process Mapping Before You Automate

To do process mapping, name one process, agree where it starts and ends, and ask the people who do the work to write every step on a sticky note. Put the notes in order, add the decisions and hand-offs, and walk through one real case to check the map. If you plan to bring in AI or automation, add one more pass: label each step by who will do it after the change.

I map processes in the audit phase of my company AI programmes, where the audit takes one to two weeks, and in my business coaching, where we look at where work stalls and fix it with the team that runs it. The method below follows the flowchart and SIPOC guides of ASQ (American Society for Quality), plus one step I add for automation.

Before the session: draw the boundaries

Pick one process. "Sales" is too big; "from inbound request to sent offer" is a process. Then answer two questions ASQ puts first: where or when does the process start, and where or when does it end?

For a wider view, fill in a SIPOC on one page before you map the details. ASQ describes it as suppliers, inputs, process, outputs and customers, with the process cut to "the key five to seven core activities".

How to do process mapping in one session

Invite the people who do the work. ASQ is blunt about it: "Do not assign a technical expert to draw the flowchart. People who perform the process should draw it." A manager who maps the process alone draws the version in the handbook, and the handbook and the inbox tell different stories.

1. Write the title and the two boundaries at the top of the wall or whiteboard.
2. List every step on its own sticky note, with the person or role who does it. Verbs work best: "check the VAT number", "copy the request into the CRM".
3. Add the decisions as separate notes: "Is the client in our region?" Each decision has two exits.
4. Put the notes in order. Move them until the room agrees.
5. Draw the arrows and mark every hand-off between people or tools.
6. Walk through one real case. Take last week's request and follow it note by note. ASQ recommends this walk-through after the first draft, and it catches the steps people forgot because they do them on autopilot.

Map the current state, the way the work runs today. The future version comes after. The Lean Enterprise Institute uses the same order for value-stream maps: a current state map first, then a future state map.

Keep the shapes to four: a box for a step, a diamond for a decision, an arrow for the flow, and a note for the time a step takes. ASQ's advice holds: the right way to draw it is the way that helps the people involved understand it.

Add times and waits

Next to each step, write how long it takes when someone works on it, and how long the work waits before the next step. The gap between the two shows you where clients wait. Lean calls the full time from start to finish the lead time. A request that needs under an hour of work can sit for days in inboxes, and automating that hour does nothing about the days.

Label every step for AI and automation

Now turn the map into a plan. Go through the steps one by one and give each a label:

• Cut: the step adds nothing. Double entry, approvals nobody reads, reports nobody opens. ASQ notes that flowcharts help "identify and eliminate nonvalue-added steps".
• Software: a fixed rule. Move data, file a document, send a notification.
• AI drafts, a person checks: writing, summarising, classifying, extracting fields from a document.
• Person: decisions with price, legal or client risk.

Cut first. Then redraw the map with the remaining steps; that is your future state. The software steps are in how to automate business processes, and the AI steps become the first workflow in how to implement AI in business.

Common process mapping mistakes

• Mapping the ideal process. You can't improve a version that nobody follows.
• Too big a scope. One map per process. If the wall runs out, split it.
• No walk-through. The first draft misses steps.
• No owner after the session. One person keeps the map current when the process changes.
• Software first. Pick a diagram tool after the team agrees on the sticky notes.

Map your first process with me

If you want the map to end in a working AI or automation workflow, the audit in my company programmes covers that work, and in Lithuania Retos galimybės (opens in a new tab) builds the automation afterwards. See the formats on my AI training page or book a call.