BUSINESS PROCESS

RE-ENGINEERING

ANGELITO C. DESCALZO, CPA

ICAEW IFRS Certified

Business Process Re-engineering

(BPR)
management

approach aiming at
improvements by means of elevating
efficiency and effectiveness of the
processes that exist within and
across organizations.

Business Process Re-engineering

the

performance of a process in a radically

new way with the objective of achieving
dramatic improvement in response time,
quality and efficiency.

is one of the several contemporary

management tools that can help an
organization to achieve and maintain a
competitive position in the global economy.

Business Process Re-engineering

has the potential to significantly improve

the operations and effectiveness of the
organization.

involves developing new ways to perform

existing activities and ways to stop nonvalue-adding activities.

The key to BPR

is for 1. organizations
to look at their
business processes from a "clean
slate" perspective and
2. determine
how they can best
construct
these
processes
to
improve how they conduct business.

Other Terms
Business Process Redesign
Business Transformation
Business Process Change Management
Business Process Improvement
Business Process Renovation.

BPR - Outline of Contents

History
Various Definitions of BPR
The Role of Information Technology
Methodology
Typical Steps in BPR
Successes
Critique
Development after 1995
Activity Analysis

History
In 1990, Michael Hammer, a former professor
of
computer
science
at
the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT),
published
an
article
in
the
Harvard Business Review, in which he claimed
that the major challenge for managers is to
obliterate non-value adding work, rather than
using technology for automating it.
This statement implicitly accused managers of having focused on the
wrong issues, namely that technology in general, and more specifically
information technology, has been used primarily for automating existing
processes rather than using it as an enabler for making non-value adding
work obsolete.

History
Hammer's claim was simple: Most of
the work being done does not add any
value for customers, and this work
should be removed, not accelerated
through automation.
Instead, companies should reconsider their processes in order to
maximize customer value, while minimizing the consumption of resources
required for delivering their product or service.

History
A similar idea was advocated by
Thomas H. Davenport and J. Short in
1990, at that time a member of the
Ernst & Young research center, in a
paper published in the Sloan
Management Review the same year as
Hammer published his paper.

History

1.
2.
3.

This idea was rapidly adopted by a huge

number of firms, which were striving for
renewed competitiveness, which they had
lost due to:
the
market
entrance
of
foreign
competitors,
their inability to satisfy customer needs,
and
their insufficient cost structure.

History
However, the critics were fast to
claim that BPR was a way to:
1. dehumanize the work place,
2. increase managerial control, and
3. to justify downsizing
(major reductions of the work force)

History
Despite this critique, reengineering
was adopted at an accelerating pace
and by 1993, as many as 65% of the
Fortune 500 companies claimed to
either have initiated reengineering
efforts, or to have plans to do so.

Various Definitions of BPR

Hammer and Champy (1993) define BPR as
"... the fundamental rethinking and radical
redesign of business processes to
achieve dramatic improvements in critical
contemporary measures of performance,
such as cost, quality, service, and speed."
Different definitions can be found and provided for in notable
publications in the field:

Various Definitions of BPR

Thomas H. Davenport (1993) says that
BPR
encompasses the envisioning of new
work strategies, the actual process
design activity, and the implementation of
the
change
in
all
its
complex
technological, human, and organizational
dimensions.
another well-known BPR theorist uses the term process innovation

Various Definitions of BPR

Johansson provided a description of
BPR relative to other processoriented views, such as Total Quality
Management (TQM) and Just-in-time
(JIT), wherein he stated:
"Business Process Reengineering,
although a close relative, seeks
radical rather than merely continuous
improvement.

Various Definitions of BPR

Johansson
It escalates the efforts of JIT and TQM to
make process orientation a strategic tool
and a core competence of the organization.
BPR concentrates on core business
processes,
and
uses
the
specific
techniques within the JIT and TQM
toolboxes as enablers, while broadening
the process vision."

The Role of Information Technology

Information technology (IT) has
historically played an important role
in the reengineering concept.
It is considered by some as a major
enabler for new forms of working
and
collaborating
within
an
organization
and
across
organizational borders.

The Role of Information Technology

Disruptive technologies that were supposed to

challenge traditional wisdom about how work
should be performed:
Shared databases, making information available at
many places
Expert systems, allowing generalists to perform
specialist tasks
Telecommunication networks, allowing
organizations to be centralized and decentralized at
the same time

The Role of Information Technology

Disruptive technologies (continued)

Decision-support tools, allowing decision-making to

be a part of everybody's job
Wireless data communication and portable
computers, allowing field personnel to work office
independent
Interactive videodisk, to get in immediate contact
with potential buyers
Automatic identification and tracking, allowing
things to tell where they are, instead of requiring to
be found
High performance computing, allowing on-the-fly
planning and revisioning

Methodology
Although the labels and steps differ slightly,
the early methodologies that were rooted in
IT-centric BPR solutions share many of the
same basic principles and elements.
The following outline is one such model,
based
on
the
PRLC
(Process
Reengineering Life Cycle) approach
developed by Guha et.al. in 1993.

Methodology
Simplified schematic outline of using a business process approach, examplified for
pharmceutical R&D:
1. Structural organization
with functional units

2. Introduction of New
Product Development as
cross-functional process

3. Re-structuring and
streamlining activities, removal
of non-value adding tasks

Methodology
Envision
New
Process

Initiating
Change

Process
Diagnosis

1. Secure management support

Identify reengineering opportunities
Identify enabling technologies
Align with corporate strategy
2. Set up reengineering team
Outline performance goals
3. Describe existing processes
Uncover pathologies in existing processes
4. Develop alternative process scenarios
Develop new process design
Design HR architecture
Select IT platform
Develop overall blueprint and gather feedback
5. Develop/install IT solution
Establish process changes
6. Performance measurement, including time, quality, cost, IT performance
Link to continuous improvement

Process
Monitoring

Process
Redesign

Reconstruction

Methodology

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

Some items to use on a process

analysis checklist are:
Reduce handoffs
Centralize data
Reduce delays
Free resources faster
Combine similar activities

Typical Steps in BPR:

Problem Definition
Systems Analysis and Evaluation
Findings and Conclusions:

- Strengths
- Weaknesses and Impact of such weaknesses
- Recommendations

Activity Analysis

is the heart of business re-engineering

is the process of identifying, describing and

evaluating the activities an organization performs

Activity Analysis

normally produces the following outcomes:

1. identification of the activities performed,
2. determination of the number of people
performing the activities,
3. calculation of the time and resources
required to perform the activities, and
4. assessment of the value of the activities
to the organization, including
recommending which one should be kept.

THE END

Business Process
Re-engineering

ANGELITO C. DESCALZO, CPA

ICAEW IFRS Certified