Improvements

Nobody has the overview of what people actually do across departments, so it's hard to know what to improve first. Once your processes are in Steplane, Improvements in the sidebar shows where the friction is, ranked, with the cheapest fix that fits each one.

The maturity ladderCopy Anchor Link

First make the process right, then make it better with AI. Using AI on work that shouldn't exist, such as copying a spreadsheet someone filled in for someone else into the ERP, hides the problem and costs money on every run. So every process sits on a rung of a ladder:

1. Described: the process is in Steplane.
2. Right: no middlemen, nothing typed in twice, no back-and-forth.
3. Connected: the systems pass things on by themselves.
4. Assisted: AI helps people who keep the decision, such as marketing setting up web pages through an AI connected to the CMS.
5. Automated: AI or a system does the steps no person needs to decide, such as answering questions the documentation already answers.

Each process shows its rung and its next step, under Maturity on its page and on its card on the landscape. What decides rungs 4 and 5 is noted on each step: Does a person need to decide? and How it's done (see Editing steps), plus whether AI can work with each system, under Settings → Systems.

The page has two parts, in that order:

• Make it right: the friction below, ranked by how often it happens.
• Then make it better: rules a system can apply, steps that can be automated, and steps where AI can help a person, ranked by people's time. A suggestion on a process that still has friction says Fix the process first: AI on top would hide it.

Friction, not just timeCopy Anchor Link

The best improvements aren't always the ones that save the most time. A marketing team that decides how a page should look and emails it to someone else, who then sets it up in the CMS, loses little time on paper. But every page passes through a middleman, gets translated along the way and goes back and forth until it's right. Letting marketing set it up in the CMS themselves may take them a little longer, and it's still better: right the first time, without anyone in between.

That's why Steplane looks for friction:

• Middleman: one role decides something and sends it by email, chat or paper to another role, who enters it into a system.
• Back and forth: work that a role sends back to another role, after deciding what it wanted earlier.
• Typed in twice: something made in one place, such as a spreadsheet, is typed into a system.
• Handoff: work passed to someone else by email, paper or by hand.
• Spreadsheet or email: a step done in a spreadsheet, email or on paper while the rest of the process runs on a business system.
• Rule-based decision: a decision that follows a rule, such as "over 10,000 needs the manager".
• Handled many times: the same document read or changed in many steps across processes.
• Rework: a step that can send the work back to be done again.
• No system: a step that takes in or produces something, but names no system: it depends on someone's memory or inbox.

Each candidate names the process, the steps and the roles involved, and says why in a sentence. On a process's Steps tab, the steps involved are marked.

The cheapest fix firstCopy Anchor Link

Each candidate suggests a fix, from the cheapest and safest to the most expensive:

1. Change the process: move the step to whoever decides, or remove it. Often the biggest improvement, and it costs nothing to run.
2. Connect the systems: an integration between two systems costs nothing to run once it's built.
3. Let a system apply the rule: rules a system can apply, so people only handle the exceptions.
4. Use AI: last, only for judgment the rest can't solve, because it costs on every run.

How it's rankedCopy Anchor Link

Candidates rank by how much friction they mean and how often they happen: a middleman on 40 orders a day matters more than one on a yearly report, and more roles in the chain mean more friction. How often a process runs is the one estimate that decides the ranking (see rough estimates). Nobody records time; Claude guesses it when you describe a process with it, and placeholders from Suggest processes start with typical values.

Each candidate shows how often it happens a year and how sure that is: Confirmed when a person gave or confirmed it, From a guess when it's still a guess. Without it, the candidate asks How often does it run? and ranks on a typical value, a little lower. When people's time on the steps is estimated, the hours show as context.

These decide the ranking lists the few frequencies that would change the top of the list. Rough answers are enough.

The list is only as good as what's described: note on each step where it's done or written down, including spreadsheets, email and paper (see What's still missing).

Acting on a candidateCopy Anchor Link

Owners, admins and editors open the ⋯ menu on a candidate:

• Record as an opportunity adds it to the process's risks and opportunities, with the suggested fix. ISO 9001 asks you to address opportunities (clause 6.1) and to improve (clause 10), so this is evidence for your audit. It's a change to the process: publish it like any other.
• Start a change project creates a change project with a version of the process to change, for example to move the step to whoever decides. Steplane keeps how many hours a year the process takes now; when the project goes live, the candidate and the project show the difference, from the estimates of the new version.
• Dismiss hides it, with a reason so others know why, such as "the supplier only sends paper". Show dismissed lists them, and Bring back opens one again.

A candidate you've acted on shows what happened to it. Reopen undoes the decision; an opportunity already on the process and a project already started stay.

Narrowing it downCopy Anchor Link

Pick a landscape group to see only its processes, with their sub-groups and subprocesses, or a role to see only what that role does. The choice is part of the page's address, so you can share it.

On the landscape, the Improvements chip highlights the processes with candidates.

With ClaudeCopy Anchor Link

Ask Claude "What should we improve first?", "Where do we type things in twice?" or "What does finance do by hand?". It uses the same candidates, explains them in your company's terms, suggests the cheapest fix that fits, and asks how often things happen when that decides the ranking. After asking you, it can record a candidate as an opportunity, start a change project for it or dismiss it.