How to Map Value Streams in the real world?

Over the years we have heard many questions about Value Stream Mapping from people who are new to VSM as well those who have used VSM before.
Questions like these are not uncommon...
Where to begin mapping the Value Stream?
How many Value Stream Maps should be created to begin Lean implementation?
What about overlapping Value Streams?
How to handle parallel Value Streams?
How much information should be captured on the Value Stream Maps?

We will try to address the above questions in the next few posts.

In this post we would like to address the reason for the above questions. The primary reason for VSM questions is the way most people think. In Lean thinking, Value is defined by the customer and it flows across multiple functions. The focus of VSM is to capture the flow of material and information across the functions by actually walking the stream. Additional information like process and wait time along with information about the person working at the process step is also captured on the Value Stream Map. Overall lead time can also be calculated and displayed on the map.

Most of the confusion around VSM is because people think about process maps or about the function/department they work in.
This is because most organizations still think about department efficiency or process steps. Value Stream Mapping crosses multiple functions in the organization.

The steps to map Value Streams is explained in the article How to Map Value Streams?on our website.