Short answer
Process design turns work into a repeatable workflow with clear steps, ownership, controls, and measures of success. This catalog separates following and documenting an existing process from designing a workflow independently and improving processes that cross teams.
About Process design
Defines repeatable workflows with clear steps, ownership, controls, and success measures. Good process design makes handoffs, decisions, exceptions, and expected outcomes visible enough for people to execute and improve the work.
Use this competency for
- Roles that document, build, or improve recurring operational workflows.
- Work where unclear ownership, handoffs, or controls can cause avoidable failure.
Do not use this competency for
- Roles that only execute a fixed workflow and are not expected to document or change it.
Important distinctions
Project management
Project management coordinates a time-bound delivery. Process design defines how recurring work should flow after a project ends.
Quality management
Quality management sets and checks output standards. Process design defines the workflow, ownership, controls, and handoffs that produce the output.
Expectations by level
IC1
Documents defined workflows
Follows established workflows and documents straightforward steps with guidance. Captures owners, inputs, outputs, and common exceptions for work within their own area.
Observable behaviors
- Maps the steps of a defined workflow in the order they occur.
- Records who owns each step and what information moves between them.
- Flags missing instructions or unclear handoffs to the process owner.
Examples
- Documents an existing request process and confirms the sequence with the people who perform each step.
- Notices that an exception has no named owner and raises it before the next request reaches that point.
IC2
Designs team workflows
Independently designs or revises recurring workflows for a team. Resolves routine tradeoffs, defines controls and exception paths, and checks whether the process produces its intended outcome.
Observable behaviors
- Designs steps and handoffs from a stated operational need.
- Defines decision points, controls, and owners for likely exceptions.
- Tests a proposed workflow with the people who will use it.
- Uses process evidence to revise steps that cause delay or rework.
Examples
- Redesigns an approval flow so routine requests and exceptions follow different documented paths.
- Runs a trial of a new intake process, reviews where work stalled, and changes the handoff instructions.
IC3
Improves cross-team processes
Leads process design for ambiguous work that spans teams. Aligns ownership and controls across boundaries, evaluates system-wide effects, and establishes patterns others can reuse.
Observable behaviors
- Frames an unclear cross-team problem as a workflow with explicit boundaries.
- Aligns teams on ownership where responsibilities or incentives conflict.
- Assesses how a process change affects upstream and downstream work.
- Creates reusable design patterns for handoffs, controls, and exceptions.
Examples
- Leads the redesign of a cross-team fulfillment process and resolves gaps between intake, execution, and confirmation.
- Identifies that a local shortcut creates downstream rework and replaces it with a shared control at the correct point.