Business Reengineering Revisited

Business Process Reengineering Revisited Good uses of a formerly discredited Business Strategy


Table of Contents

List of Abbreviations 1. Introduction

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2.

Business Process Reengineering (BPR) 2.1 2.2 2.3 The Reengineering Concept The Participants (Who will perform the BPR) The Methodology

1 2 2 3 4 5 8 iv

3. BPR Criticism 4. BPR Successful Implementation 5.Conclusions References

ii

List of Abbreviations

BPR TQM

Business Process Reengineering Total Quality Management

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1.

Introduction

The main aim of this paper is to review the Business Process Reengineering (BPR) idea from its initial formulation by Michael Hammer, to describe its basic concepts and to illustrate how despite the general negative image it earned during the lastdecade, its thoughtful implementation can still lead to a rapid and decisive growth without the usually associated negative effects that came with it. This report is made of four main parts. In the first part, the origin of the idea is underlined, and then it is summarized and examined. This part is mainly based on the book by Michael Hammer and James Champy “Reengineering the corporation”. In thesecond part the criticism that this management technique has suffered is described and explained. In the third part, the implementation of a BPR by Corning Inc. shows how this process can be successfully articulated without the associated negative effects. Finally, a conclusion to the findings in this research is drawn.

2.

Business Process Reenginering (BPR)

Although for some the idea ofBusiness Process Reengineering can be traced back to the concept of “Strategic leap” proposed by Robert H. Hayes and Steven C. Wheelright in 1994 (Lowrekovich, 1996), two American consultants (Michael Hammer and James Champy) are considered as the authors who popularized the idea. According to their claims, they noticed during the early 1980s “that a few companies had dramatically improved theirperformance…by radically changing the ways in which they worked” (Hammer and Champy, 1993, p. 5). Most of the companies in the world had until then based their business development on a continuous incremental improvement program like Total Quality Management (TQM), but this could not generate results as dramatic as the ones observed in these companies. After studying the methodology followed by them,Hammer and Champy formulated their idea of BPR, first in an article published by Hammer in 1990 (Hammer, 1990), and later with the publication of a book that formulated the BPR creed (Hammer and Champy, 1993)

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2.1 The Reengineering Concept The concept for BPR given by Hammer and Champy in his book was the following: “is the fundamental rethinking and radical redesign of business processesto achieve dramatic improvements in critical, contemporary measures of performance, such as cost, quality, service and speed” (Hammer and Champy, 1993, p. 32-36).. The key words “Fundamental” (asking the basic or fundamental questions to be solved), Radical (Obliterate the old before redesign), Dramatic (as opposed to marginal or incremental) and Process (what is to be redesigned, as opposed totask, job, people or department) define the objectives of the BPR effort. 2.2 The Participants (Who will perform the BPR) Hammer and Champy define the following roles in a typical BPR implementation: The Leader: The leader makes the BPR happen for the whole company. He must be a senior executive with enough clout to cause an organization to turn itself inside out and upside down and to persuadepeople to accept the radical disruptions that reengineering brings. He must designate the process owners and the reengineering czar (Hammer and Champy, 1993, p. 103-108). The process owner: Is responsible for reengineering a specific process. Should be a seniorlevel manager with prestige, credibility and clout within the company (Hammer and Champy, 1993, p. 108-109). The Reengineering Team: Performs...