Improved Is the Process Driving

¶ … improved is the process driving to work. This process has a number of different steps, some of which can occasionally add significant time to the commuting process. The flow chart for going to work can be found as Appendix a.

A number of different factors affected the process design. Some of the steps are sequential in nature -- one must be performed either before or after other steps. This creates constraints on the process. For example, the process of getting on the freeway must fall in the middle of the commute. The processes before and after the freeway can be adjusted, but without the freeway there is no way to get to work faster. All non-freeway alternatives have been established as non-viable. This means that the routing and process is constrained somewhat by the need to enter and exit the freeway and by the benefits of being able to do this easily. Another factor that affected the design was the ability to move some functions out of the morning commute entirely. For example, coffee acquisition and fuelling are both processes that add time to the morning commute but do not necessarily need to be a part of that commute.

Another factor that affects the process design is time of day. Traffic patterns shift at different times as do the required steps (for example, coffee is not a necessary part of the process for work that begins in the afternoon). In addition, leaving earlier or later can also have an impact on the best possible process for commuting to work. The best process design will take these different factors into account, such that potentially there could be multiple process designs depending on some of the variables that are present in the daily situation.

A key metric for the process design is the total commuting time. There are other possible metrics, such as the number of unique steps or the number of miles traveled, but the ultimate objective of this exercise is to lower the amount of time that is spent commuting. As such, the best metric for this process improvement is commuting time compared with the current commuting time.

The original flowchart for the process of driving to work has a number of key points where time can be lost. For example, the step at the beginning where the amount of fuel is checked is a short step itself, but if there is insufficient fuel then the step becomes long because the gas station stop must be added to the total commuting time. A process improvement would be to move this step entirely to the commute home. Such a move is logical, because coming home there is less time pressure (i.e. there is no "late" coming home whereas there is a "late" time for arriving to work). Another step where adjustments could be made is at the coffee acquisition part of the process. The independent coffee shop is the preferred choice, but it has no drive-through so it takes longer to acquire coffee than if the Starbucks with the drive-through was selected. Coffee could also be made at home, allowing for further reduction in commuting time.

The process could also be improved through the choice of different routes. The usual route has a higher speed limit, but has some very long lights at a few shopping centers. If these lights are green, the trip can be very fast but usually these lights are red so on average the trip is long compared with another possible route on smaller roads that have less traffic and shorter lights. The process therefore can be improved not only by making alternations to a number of different steps but also by changing the way that some of the steps are executed.