Which process should you map first?
Choose one completed quote, proposal, handoff, or approval with a verifiable beginning and outcome. Keep routine cases and exceptions identifiable rather than combining them into a route that never occurred. The first map should reveal what to investigate, not attempt to describe the entire company.
What information belongs in a business process map?
Record what each person received, did, needed, and passed on, together with decisions, waits, returns, and exceptions. Check the sequence against available records. The NATA Work Map below organizes meaningful events so the diagram reflects actual work rather than only the intended procedure.
Use a NATA Work Map with one row per meaningful event.
| Event | Person or team | Information needed | Decision or action | Wait, return, or exception |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Request arrives | Who receives it? | What was supplied? | What happens first? | What is unclear? |
| Work progresses | Who acts next? | What must be known? | What changes the state? | What sends it backward? |
| Outcome reached | Who confirms completion? | What proves the result? | What can happen now? | What remains unresolved? |
The table is a prompt for observation. It should not imply that every process has exactly three events.
How do you connect a process map to the customer journey?
Alongside each internal transition, record what the customer or receiving employee needs to accomplish. Forwarding an email may complete an internal step while leaving the recipient unable to act. Compare the company’s completion marker with the information and decision the next person actually needs.
GOV.UK’s journey-mapping guidance connects the user’s journey with the processes behind delivery. That perspective helps expose the gap between a completed internal step and a completed task for the person using the service.
How do you identify a bottleneck without assuming its cause?
Describe the observed wait or return before explaining it. A case waiting for a named decision is evidence of delay; a claim that the approver lacked the current specification needs confirmation. Mark unknowns and test alternative explanations so the map does not make a plausible story appear proven.
Preserve those distinctions. A map can make a story look more certain than the evidence warrants. Mark unknown causes explicitly rather than filling every box with a plausible explanation.
How do you test a suspected process problem?
Inspect a real case and the records available at the disputed transition. In this illustrative proposal handoff, confusion could arise from unclear scope, an inaccessible final version, or a link to a draft. Test the specific explanation by changing one relevant part and checking whether the receiver can act.
Inspect the document used by each team and the point where it was transferred. A trial might link the agreed version directly to the handoff and ask the receiving person to explain the next action. If confusion remains, the problem may concern the scope itself.
What should you do after mapping the process?
Choose a bounded intervention with an owner, expected change, and review condition. Keep the original map and annotate the trial. Follow another comparable case afterward, looking for the original difficulty and new work created elsewhere before deciding whether to keep or expand the change.
Keep the original map and annotate what changed. After the trial, follow another comparable job. Look for new work created elsewhere as well as the original delay. A useful map remains connected to an actual piece of work that people can recognize and improve.
Frequently asked questions
Do you need process-mapping software to start?
No. A simple event table can reveal information, decisions, waits, and returns. Choose software when it helps people maintain or use the map, rather than treating the tool as the investigation.
Can one completed job represent the whole process?
One case can show a route that actually occurred and suggest what to investigate. It cannot establish how often that route occurs. Compare additional routine and exceptional cases before generalizing.
Should the official procedure be ignored?
No. Use it to compare intended roles and steps with actual work. A workaround may reveal an unmet need, so understand its purpose before removing it.
Sources and case basis
This guide presents a working method, not measured client results. Examples are illustrative unless explicitly attributed. Sources linked in the text support the stated principle or published example; they do not validate the NATA worksheet as an assessed instrument. Prepared and revised November 4, 2026.