MANAGEMENT INSIGHTS FROM DAVID BOWMAN
Look closer at how your organisation works.
Practical thinking on process improvement, accountability and operational assurance. Explore the gap between what management expects and what people can consistently deliver.
These articles examine familiar management problems through Define, Communicate, Assure: establish what is required, make it understood and check the evidence of delivery.
A QUESTION FOR MANAGEMENT
When everyone completes their part, does the whole process work?
Local decisions can appear sensible while creating delays, uncertainty or extra work elsewhere. Understanding those connections is a useful starting point for better management control.
START WITH THE PROBLEM YOU RECOGNISE
Processes, ownership and evidence.
Each article considers a specific management issue, the questions that help reveal its cause and practical ways to approach improvement.
MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS AND TECHNOLOGY
Moving from spreadsheets to a controlled management system
Spreadsheets can support useful local controls. As more people, processes and decisions become connected, management needs to consider how ownership, versions, access and follow-through will be maintained.
This article examines the requirements to define before changing tools and how to avoid carrying unclear processes into a new platform.
Define the control before choosing the tool.
What information must be reliable? Who can change it? What should happen next? How will an overdue action or missing approval become visible?
Those answers give a platform implementation a practical purpose and a basis for checking whether it works.
THE THINKING THAT CONNECTS THESE ARTICLES
Define. Communicate. Assure.
DCA provides a consistent way to examine management problems, from a single task to an organisation-wide process.
Define
Establish the outcome, requirements and responsibilities. Check that delivery is achievable with the people, time, skills and resources available.
Communicate
Make the requirements understood by the people involved. Clarify decisions, handovers and what to do when the agreed approach cannot be followed.
Assure
Examine evidence that the work is being delivered as intended. Use findings to address weaknesses and check whether changes have achieved their purpose.