Culture conducive for process ownership based on the Iceberg model and the computer emergency response team (CERT) values

The culture of the organisation has been acknowledged as a critical enabler for BPM adoption (Buh and Stemberger, 2016, Schmiedel et al., 2015). They state that a culture is compounded by beliefs, values, attitudes, and behaviors that are displayed in an organisation. At Co. INS the executive committee refers to the “rituals” that are required to entrench a certain identity, adoption, and sense of belonging with regards to process excellence. Schmiedel et al. (2015) refer to a common analogy of culture as an iceberg with visible elements (“above the surface”) like actions and structures, as well as the invisible core of the iceberg, i.e. (“below the surface”) values and underlying assumptions. In Figure 29 the iceberg model is populated with items identified in the literature, as well as values, actions and structures used in the Px Vision and Px Training.

Ongoing process conversations will influence a Lean culture, as a culture is created through a number of facets, including the conversations the company has (Flamholtz and Randle, 2012). The Lean culture in turn will foster servant leadership, which is one of the key components for service excellence (Liker, 2023). Servant leadership is all about supporting the employee to work at his/her best possible level, and hence it will drive process conversations again, but also employee engagement as they would feel supported and inspired. In turn employee engagement, together with servant leadership, would allow time for daily huddles and PDCAs to be done, which would in turn lead to improved processes. “Success breeds Success” (van de Rijt et al., 2014) and hence the more process improvements happen when process ownership has also been deployed (Weitlaner et al., 2012), i.e. the cycle re-enforces the behavior again. A culture creates a common purpose (Flamholtz and Randle, 2011) and is the glue that makes people “belong” to an organisation. It can be very inspiring, or extremely toxic, and differs from department to department and from team to team. The critical component to create a specific culture is leadership (Schein and Schein, 2016).

According to Flamholtz and Randle (2012) a culture is manifested in the language between people, e.g. the acronyms which are so frequently used and created for just about anything. Or the performance feedback people get as either recognized for their contribution or reprimanded for their lack of performance. Flamholtz (2012) states that the strength of a culture, rather than the financial rewards, will unleash that last 10% of people’s dedication and effort through honoring them, respecting them and making them feel involved and wanted. It is visible in the artefacts on the walls, or on peoples’ desks, e.g. the company values on the walls, or the branded screen saver, or the branded coffee mugs or T-Shirts (Flamholtz and Randle, 2011).

But it is also visible in the goals for performance and metrics used to measure performance as either customer driven, e.g. customer satisfaction, or an internal set of metrics, e.g. productivity of staff. A culture with the intention and commitment towards process orientation becomes “real” through the narrative of process ownership (Kohlbacher and Gruenwald, 2011a). The evaluation episode to assess the validity of the culture components presented was done on the 3 components of the iceberg model: actions, structures and values.

The participants were asked to rate the following on all 3 components:

• The maturity of each component in their teams (Current Rating out of 4)
  “Rate to what degree are these actions visible in your department currently”

• The relative importance of each component as part of a potential top 10 actions for process ownership (Selection – a count)
  “Which of the items in the list would you select as important for a process world?” (Min 10)

Van Looy et al. (2014) concur that the values must include intense customer focus, empowerment of staff, innovation, collaboration across different disciplines, and trust. These values and skills regarding prioritizing process and the process mindset must enrich the current job descriptions and growth path of staff (Van Looy et al., 2014, Shafagatova and Van Looy, 2019). Kohlbacher and Gruenwald (2011a) add teamwork, willingness to change, personal accountability, cooperative leadership style which involve employees in setting goals and standards (Laureani and Antony, 2019), and frequent process related communication. Shafagatova and Van Looy (2019) state the need for a culture that includes focus on the customer, continuous improvement/excellence and innovation, responsibility/accountability and teamwork/collaboration, i.e. the so-called CERT values, as an acronym, referring to these major values underpinning BPM deployment (Schmiedel et al., 2013, Schmiedel et al., 2015), as discussed in the next paragraph (See Figure 30).

Customer orientation (C) refers to a proactive and flexible approach to the needs of the customer, or the recipient of the deliverables of the process. Excellence (E) refers to an attitude of innovation and continuous improvement to constantly aim for a better and more consistent performance of processes. Responsibility (R) refers to the ownership of the process and dedication to the objectives of the process, especially the strategic objectives. Teamwork (T) refers to the acceptable and inspiring engagement or collaboration with cross-functional teams and leadership on different levels to foster positive engagement towards BPM success and process thinking.

The CERT-value assessment is recommended as a guide to assess the readiness of the enterprise. The analysis was done by the team in order to confirm the readiness of the different teams. Team 2 seems to be more ready with a higher average rating on all the components in the assessment, except for teamwork component, consisting of teamwork across formal structures and teamwork across informal structures. The key finding from this evaluation confirms the readiness of Team 2 for the pilot. This confirms the results in the previous sections, which then also mean the individual actions, structures and values are good indicators for culture as the results correspond with the CERT value assessment. This then indicate Team 2 as the team where the pilot in episode “v” should take place.