Balanced Scorecards and Operational Dashboards with Microsoft Excel, 2nd Edition

Chapter 13

Drawing Process and Strategy Maps

As I grow older, I pay less attention to what people say. I just watch what they do.

—Andrew Carnegie

Industrialist

1835–1919

Strategy Maps, value stream maps, and process maps of all types provide visual clarity. They make complex processes understandable and memorable. They also make it significantly easier to identify the points in a strategy or process where you can get leverage to create the greatest impact. As soon as you have identified these points of impact, you can identify the metrics to measure.

This chapter shows you how to draw Strategy Maps and simple business process maps using the tools built into Microsoft Office. Additional drawing and mapping tools are described in Chapter 27.

Which Drawing Tool Should You Use?

Strategy Maps and process maps range from simple maps you create once, which only need to be “good enough,” to maps that dynamically link to databases that update continuously and are critical to operations. Figure 13-1 shows a Strategy Map drawn in Microsoft PowerPoint 2010. A range of software exists that can satisfy your needs across the spectrum.

Figure 13-1: Microsoft Office has drawing tools that can create Strategy Maps and simple business process maps.

This chapter describes different software solutions with different levels of user knowledge and different levels of output. Of course, these have different ...