Quality & Performance Excellence 6th Edition by James Evans

Exercise 17

You Want Us to Work With Marketing
On her second day as division level financial manager, one of Kay's employees (someone she had known for several years) told her about a transactional problem with sales data. Kay suggested that the employee resolve the issue with someone in marketing. The response was the last thing she expected: "Our department hasn't talked to marketing about these kinds of problems for seven years."
Shocked, Kay decided to do some investigating. She called one of the marketing managers she had known for many years and asked what he knew about this problem. He confirmed there was an issue between the two departments but said he didn't understand the details. What made this situation even more puzzling was that this barrier had survived a move of the entire division (85 people) from Denver to Phoenix six years earlier. Significant synergy could be gained by having the two groups work closely. How could managers in either department have permitted these silos Did they lack the courage to address the problem, or were they so disengaged from the day-to-day activities that they didn't even see it
To address this issue, Kay wanted to have both groups share their process flows with each other in a series of joint departmental meetings. Each session would develop process thinking and help the groups understand how to support each other by seeing themselves as customers and suppliers of each other. She called the marketing manager again and shared her plan. Without hesitation, he agreed to help. The marketing department already had process maps it shared with customers. They agreed not to tell their groups what situation had initiated these sessions.
Within a week, the first session was scheduled. It was interesting to watch everyone find a seat. One group gathered on the right side of the room and the other on the left. The meeting went well. At first, there were no questions or discussion, but toward the end, employees from both groups began exchanging ideas about how they could better support each other at their process touchpoints-the points at which the two departments' processes overlapped. The morning after the first session, one of the marketing employees came to Kay's department to ask for help with a process problem. Within three weeks, a customer service manager asked the group to participate in a conference call to the computer support department. The purpose of the call was to raise the priority for fixing a marketing system problem that resulted in data errors for both marketing and my department.
Because marketing now understood more about the data flow connection between our departments, they also understood the impact of the system error reached beyond the marketing group and recognized the potential to help both groups by correcting the problem. This joint effort was the first of many synergistic efforts between the departments. Remaining process review sessions were scheduled regularly, and cooperation between both groups continued to grow.
Discussion Question
What types of tools and techniques can be used to help to support a process focus and improve the process of change