Coloring Draw Workflow Diagram Lovely Elegantlow Line Data Softwareree Downloadlowchart

By Yvonne Hertz on December 04 2018 12:01:58

Once the team recognizes the problem areas, they can easily adjust the map to a future state version that can dramatically affect performance and turnaround time of the purchase order process.

Each flowchart should ideally begin with a Terminator shape, from which the next step should be linked. Each shape should be indicative of a specific stage in the process and there are conventions for each of these, the most common being the rectangular "Process" shape. Many others exist, however, including shapes representing Data, Documents and Decisions. Decision shapes are diamonds, each of the four corners (or nodes) being either a link from the preceding shape or action to be taken in the next stage depending on the decision.

As a process mapping consultant, it is imperative to get everyone to see not only their own procedures, but how they interconnect into the organizational structure. Once in place and agreed upon by all the contributors, you begin to be able to challenge the current way of doing business and assist them in finding inefficiencies that could be costing the business thousands of dollars.

A flowchart could be defined as a pictorial representation of a process in which the steps are symbolized by shapes - in other words a diagram that explains the steps in a procedure. Each shape should link to its neighbour by a connector line, and often these have arrow heads to describe the direction of flow.

Many of us use flowcharts in our daily work - indeed the creation and deployment of a flowchart is one of the most common tasks in business today. But what do we mean by a flowchart, and what is it supposed to do?

Flowcharts can be quickly created in many computer software programs; even recent versions of Microsoft Word and PowerPoint contain Smart Shapes that allow users to rapidly insert a flowchart into a document of presentation. Specialist Flowchart Diagramming software also exists but for sheer versatility and the ability to connect data to shapes I would put my money on Microsoft Visio. It has a huge range of ready-made stencils containing all the shapes you could possibly need (and the ability to create your own if you wish), and very slick automatic connection features. Visio also allow a flowchart that dexcribes one process to become part of a larger process and to integrate with it via a hyperlink from a button on the drawing page.