Unfortunately, in this great country of ours, I have yet to see a good Value Flow Map. What I have come across are strange hybrids of process maps and value streams that give me chills. I want to explain the differences between the two, which are quite fundamental.
Value Flow Map:
- Shows how a Client is serviced
- Shows the entire business as a whole
- Illustrates how we service Clients (present state) in the whole company
- Shows direction of how we would like to service Clients (future state)
- Shows waste between processes
- Is high-level
- Shows systemic improvements
- Is created using a variety (even several dozen) symbols
- Includes suppliers and clients
- We can calculate Lead Time from it (based on times of individual processes)
- You read it from the back
Process Map:
- Illustrates the processing of a product or transaction
- Shows a singular process in a company
- Shows added value and waste in a particular process
- Future state maps can also be created
- Is detailed
- Shows process improvements – quicker to implement
- Is created using 4 symbols
- Usually applies to a specific process, though may be cross-functional
- Processing Time can be calculated
- You read it from the beginning
Summing up:
Let’s take a pizzeria as an example. Value Flow Map will show us how a client receives what he or she ordered and what the whole restaurant looks like; Process Map, on the other hand, will show to make a pepperoni and mushroom pizza.