Scope a customer journey and assemble a cross-functional team before the first mapping workshop.
Quality & Productivity
Value Stream Mapping Customer Journeys to Remove Non-Value Steps
Map a customer journey as a value stream, classify each step as value-adding or not, and design a future state that removes non-value steps, prioritised as kaizen bursts with named owners.
🗓️Duration5 training days
📚Content4 modules · 8 sessions
🎓On completionAccredited attendance certificate
About the programme
Course Overview
Customers rarely complain about a single broken step; they complain about the whole journey taking too long, with no visibility into why. Value stream mapping applied to a customer journey traces every step, handoff and wait between a request and its fulfilment, recording real cycle times and quality scores rather than the process as it was designed on paper. This course teaches scoping a journey with a cross-functional team, capturing voice of customer evidence before the walk, and building a current state map with process and data boxes that most teams have never seen assembled in one place. Sessions move into classifying value-adding, non-value-adding and necessary steps, designing a future state that removes what does not serve the customer, and prioritising the resulting kaizen bursts by impact and effort. The course closes on assigning ownership and re-mapping the journey to confirm a change has actually stuck rather than quietly reverted. Participants finish able to lead a mapping workshop from scope to a funded improvement plan.
Expected Learning Outcomes
Capture voice of customer evidence and translate it into specific touchpoints worth examining.
Build a current state map recording process boxes, cycle time, wait time and handoffs accurately.
Classify each journey step as value-adding, non-value-adding or necessary non-value-adding.
Design a future state map that removes, combines or resequences steps to shorten the journey.
Prioritise kaizen bursts by impact and effort, sequencing dependent changes into a funded plan.
Re-map a journey after implementation to confirm gains hold and address any drift back to old habits.
Who Should Attend
Process improvement and lean practitioners mapping service or transactional journeys.
Customer experience and operations managers responsible for end-to-end journey performance.
Business analysts and project leads scoping a process improvement initiative.
Quality and continuous improvement teams supporting a value stream mapping workshop.
Department heads whose teams participate in a cross-functional customer journey.
Programme managers building a prioritised, funded backlog of process improvements.
Course Modules
Select any module to see its sessions and points.
01Preparing to Map a Customer Journey as a Value Stream
2 sessions · 8 points
Session 1Scoping the Journey and Assembling a Cross-Functional Team
- Scope the customer journey to a single defined start and end point before inviting the mapping team to a room.
- Assemble a cross-functional team that includes every department the journey passes through, not just the sponsor's own.
- Set a clear boundary for what is in and out of scope so the map does not expand into the whole business.
- Agree the map's purpose and success measure with the process owner before the first workshop begins.
Session 2Capturing Voice of Customer Before Mapping the Process
- Gather voice of customer evidence on where the journey currently frustrates or delays the people it serves.
- Distinguish what the customer values from what the process was originally designed to protect internally.
- Translate customer feedback into specific journey touchpoints the mapping team should examine in detail.
- Brief the mapping team on customer evidence before the walk so the map targets real complaints, not guesses.
02Building the Current State Map
2 sessions · 8 points
Session 1Walking the Journey and Recording Process and Data Boxes
- Walk the actual journey with the team, recording each step as a process box in the order it truly happens.
- Record cycle time, wait time and percent complete and accurate in a data box beneath each process step.
- Capture every handoff between departments or systems, since handoffs are where a journey most often stalls.
- Note the information and approval flows running alongside the physical or digital journey on the same map.
Session 2Classifying Steps as Value-Add, Non-Value-Add or Necessary
- Classify each step as value-adding, non-value-adding or necessary non-value-adding from the customer's perspective.
- Challenge a step defended only as how the team has always done it against the value-add test before accepting it.
- Total touch time against total lead time to show how much of the journey is spent waiting rather than progressing.
- Flag steps with the lowest percent complete and accurate score as early candidates for a kaizen burst.
03Designing and Prioritising the Future State
2 sessions · 8 points
Session 1Designing a Future State Map That Removes Non-Value Steps
- Design a future state map that removes, combines or resequences steps identified as non-value-adding.
- Set a target lead time and percent complete and accurate score the future state map is designed to achieve.
- Introduce pull, batching or scheduling changes into the future state where they will shorten the customer's wait.
- Validate the proposed future state against the voice of customer evidence gathered before the mapping workshop.
Session 2Prioritising Kaizen Bursts by Impact and Effort
- Mark each proposed change as a kaizen burst on the map, sized by its expected impact on lead time or quality.
- Score kaizen bursts against impact and implementation effort to build a sequenced improvement plan.
- Separate a kaizen burst a team can implement locally from one that needs a cross-functional or system change.
- Agree with sponsors which bursts to fund first based on the scoring rather than the loudest voice in the room.
04Implementing and Sustaining the Future State
2 sessions · 8 points
Session 1Building an Implementation Plan and Ownership for Each Burst
- Assign a named owner and a target date to every kaizen burst carried forward from the mapping workshop.
- Build an implementation plan that sequences dependent bursts so an early change does not block a later one.
- Set an interim metric for each burst so progress is visible before the full future state is reached.
- Communicate the future state map and plan to everyone whose role the journey change will affect.
Session 2Re-Mapping the Journey to Confirm Improvement Sticks
- Re-walk the journey after implementation to confirm the future state map reflects what actually happens now.
- Compare lead time, touch time and percent complete and accurate against the baseline in the current state map.
- Identify where an implemented change has drifted back towards the old process and correct it before it fully reverts.
- Set a review date to re-map the journey again as volumes, systems or customer expectations continue to shift.
What the participant receives
4 course modules
A structured syllabus
8 training sessions
across 5 days
32 detailed points
Applied, detailed content
Accredited attendance certificate
On completing the programme
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