What Are Operational Business Processes?

What are Operational Business Processes (Core Business Processes)?

Depending on the organization’s activity business processes are often broken up into different categories (for more information read the relative article about the types of business processes). One of these categories is the “operational business processes”.

During your search regarding the operational process meaning, you will realize that there are several different terms for operational processes. You can find them as primary processes, essential processes, and core processes. However, all of them are supposed to refer to the essential business activities/tasks that deliver value to the customer by contributing to the process of producing a product or a service.

Operational processes or core business processes are the “key activities or cluster of activities which must be performed in an exemplary manner to ensure a firm’s continued competitiveness because it adds primary value to an output.”

Dealing with these processes is very crucial as these are the fundamental processes that affect directly the deliverables to the clients. Well-defined operational processes help organizations to adapt to any market change smoothly, providing at the same time boundless valuable information. After creating operational business processes, extra elements can be added to improve outputs, optimize and improve processes,  and finally achieve operational and process excellence.

The Difference Between Operational Processes, Business Processes, and Business Process Operations

Operational Business Processes, Business Processes, and Business Process Operations are not the same, although they are closely related. In short, operational business processes are specific activities that are performed regularly by an organization to add value to the end-user, business processes are the broader workflows designed to meet strategic objectives, while business process operations refer to the management and optimization efforts that ensure these processes run smoothly and efficiently.

Understanding Operational Business Processes

This refers to the core activities or tasks that an organization performs regularly to deliver its products or services. These processes are essential to the day-to-day functioning of the business.
Example: Order fulfillment, customer support, inventory management, and product development are all operational business processes.

Understanding Business Processes

Business processes refer to a broader range of activities or workflows that an organization follows to achieve its strategic goals and objectives. These processes are more comprehensive and may span multiple departments or teams. They define the sequence of tasks that guide the business toward achieving its vision, from the strategic planning stage to the final delivery of products or services.
Example: The product development process, which includes research, design, manufacturing, and marketing, is a business process.

Understanding Business Process Operations

This term typically refers to the management and optimization of those operational business processes. It focuses on overseeing how these processes are performed, ensuring they are efficient, effective, and aligned with business goals. It can also involve monitoring, controlling, and improving operational processes to achieve better business performance.

Operational Business Processes Within a Company

As mentioned before, those processes are customer-oriented because their main feature is to directly add value to the customer. It is up to each business to define what it considers an operational process.

Some of the operational business processes of a company can be found in the following business areas:

• Marketing
• Sales
• Logistics – Product Delivery
• Operations
• Customer Support

Identifying Operational Business Processes

Identifying operational processes is a tricky procedure since giving attention and focusing on details is demanding. You can define these processes by combining the inputs, outputs, sequential activity, and an objective to manage and improve business processes.

1. Evaluate inputs and outputs

The first step should be the evaluation of inputs and outputs. Your inputs are all the resources for your company such as materials, knowledge, and human resources, whereas outputs are deployed to cut down on the extended use of your potential resources. The difference between inputs and outputs lies in the cost. The more you use the inputs the higher the cost will be. On the other hand, the cost of the outputs declines when their use increases.

2. Asking for feedback

Secondly, find the best practice between hundreds by asking for feedback. Poll your employees to identify needs or procedures’ descriptions or ask your customers for their opinions. Are they satisfied with your services? Do they feel that something is missing from your operational processes?

3. Make your Process Analysis

Continue with analyzing your processes. Check the potential risks, such as extra taxes or capital costs. Moreover, think if you are producing your product/ service with the minimum cost in the minimum time. Have you managed error rates and ROI?

4. Analyze your results

Finally, measure data before starting the operational process implementation and then analyze the results. Are you satisfied enough with the results? If the answer is “Yes”, then start applying your processes and set it as a manual one.

Comidor offers business process automation and management capabilities, that can help you throughout the entire process.  It helps you in orchestrating,  developing, analyzing, and monitoring the processes at each task level, as well as evaluating the overall business performance.

The main key is to optimize these operational processes, and the aim of it is to add value at every step, to give additional value to the product/ service that gets delivered to the client. Improving these processes has a direct effect on the output of the business.

As it is referred by TechRepublic, it is also important to educate participants on operational processes and inform them about positive results and implementation.

It is worth mentioning that you should remeasure your operational business processes’ results because technology, methods, and behavior are changing constantly.

Why is Identifying and Automating Operational Processes Important?

1. Increases Efficiency

Identifying and automating operational processes streamlines tasks, reduces manual effort, and eliminates redundancies. Automation allows teams to focus on higher-value activities, improving overall productivity and workflow efficiency.

2. Reduces Human Error

Manual processes are prone to mistakes, which can lead to costly errors. By automating repetitive tasks, the risk of human error is significantly minimized, ensuring consistent and accurate results.

3. Saves Time and Costs

Automating operational processes leads to faster completion of tasks, ultimately saving time. This efficiency translates into cost savings, as fewer resources are needed to complete the same work.

4. Enhances Scalability

As a business grows, scaling operations becomes challenging. Automation enables processes to handle larger volumes of work without additional manual labor, making it easier to scale up without a proportional increase in overhead.

5. Improves Decision-Making

Business Process Automation tools can provide real-time data and insights, giving businesses a clearer view of performance. With this information, decision-makers can make informed choices based on up-to-date data, leading to better strategic planning.

6. Boosts Employee Satisfaction

When employees are freed from repetitive and mundane tasks through automation, they can focus on more engaging and creative aspects of their work. This leads to higher job satisfaction and a more motivated and empowered workforce.

Streamlining Operational Processes with Comidor

Business Process Management platforms, like the Comidor platform which combines BPM, Low-Code, and cognitive automation features, help businesses to reach a successful implementation of consistent processes and accomplish their continuous optimization.

The post was originally published on October 18, 2017.