Business process reengineering: Restructuring customers and achievements

What is business process reengineering?  

Business process reengineering (BPR) is a strategic change management process aimed at enhancing management by reinventing how work is done. This blog will look into these and other subtopics related to BPR, with sufficient illustrations and examples of best practices to show how effective BPR is in organizations.

BPR is simply the radical transformation of the inner workings of organizations to impact productivity, improve operations, and enhance performance quality. This is different than gradual change, which relies on small improvements and strives to build into an existing system, such as adding more computers to an office. BPR aims to remove no-value activities and intensify operations to level unnecessary costs with value addition to customers and other stakeholders.

A textbook case of BPR is Ford Motor Company, which redesigned its operational processes in the 1980s. In parallel with BPR approaches, Ford succeeded in cutting back on production expenditures while increasing the quality of vehicles produced, which naturally resulted in more sales. Using the combination of innovative practices and technology, Ford revamped its business and became one of the most successful players in the automotive market.

Why BPR is important 

In today’s organizational ecosystem, BPR should be at the center of an organization to stay relevant and successful among the competition. BPR gives companies the opportunity to enhance performance by shortening the cycle time of production, improving customer relations, and the performance of the business as a whole when incompetency is identified and eliminated.

For instance, in the 1990s, IBM embarked on a full-scale BPR change program aimed at improving the way they provided services to clients. By offering the right product for customers at the right time and by making appropriate improvements to their processes, they satisfied customers and cut operational costs. Improving service operation efficiency not only made IBM the most efficient company in its industry but also demonstrated the role BPR can play in technology companies.

Core comprised principles of BPR 

To achieve success in any reengineering project, several BPR principles are used in an organization to properly steer the BPR effort. These principles include a focus on outcomes, process orientation, and the elimination of silos within the organization.

Focus on outcomes 

Customer satisfaction should be the prime goal for any business, and its processes should be designed in a manner that creates the desired outcome. All processes should be oriented towards the objectives set by the company.

Process orientation 

This shifts the focus of the organization to processes—various interlinked activities—rather than looking at the organization as numerous unrelated functional departments. This viewpoint encourages teamwork and collaboration to meet the same goals.

Elimination of silos 

When different groups work in their own bubbles instead of collaborating with each other, it sometimes results in inefficient repeated work. This can hinder growth and create conflicts among the different departments. By eliminating these silos and leaning into collaboration, organizations can improve the quality of their work and smooth inter-department relationships.

For instance, hospital BPR principles enabled Virginia Mason Medical Center to focus on patient care and decrease non-essential activities. The systematic approach the organization adopted, focusing on outcomes and eliminating silos, greatly improved their healthcare service.

Steps to implement BPR 

Here are the steps to begin using BPR in an organization.

1. Identifying processes for reengineering: An organization should begin by defining which processes need to be improved upon. This could involve examining current processes to find existing weaknesses and bottlenecks.
2. Analyzing current workflows: After the processes are identified, businesses need to examine how these processes are being executed. This provides an opportunity to identify pain points and information gaps.
3. Designing new processes: After reviewing the current situation, it's time to develop new processes for the organization to work toward organizational goals and objectives. This may include changes in roles, responsibilities, and processes.
4. Implementing changes: This is the step where an organization begins to execute the newly designed processes in order of importance. It's important to involve stakeholders as well as training employees during this step to guarantee all changes are implemented properly and accepted.
5. Continuous monitoring and refinement: Implementing BPR is not a one-off activity. Organizations need to perform follow-up evaluations on the processes' performance and rectify areas that do not lead to the expected results.

An outstanding case in point of BPR is GE Company, which was able to successfully transform its order fulfillment processes. By employing the above-mentioned procedures, GE managed to enhance speed-to-market and increase customer satisfaction.

Challenges in BPR 

Although the benefits of BPR are clear, some organizations will encounter various problems at the implementation stage.

• Resistance to change: Employees may go through the change process but resist the actual change due to worries about losing their jobs or just apathy toward adapting. Effective management is crucial to overcome this.
• Lack of leadership support: Top management backing is essential to guarantee that BPR approaches are fruitful. If top management does not embrace it, objectives may not be realized due to the unavailability of resources or direction.
• Insufficient resources: Like many other initiatives, it is usually costly to execute BPR. With limited resources—time, personnel, and money—such projects cannot be successful. Sufficient resources should be allocated to achieve success.

The strategy recommended to confront these challenges presents an opportunity to create a favorable environment for implementing change, adequate training, and good communication on the merits of BPR to the relevant parties.

Measuring success in BPR 

Organizations have to evaluate how successful BPR efforts are along with the impact of some of these actions. They should set key performance indicators (KPIs) in accordance with their targeted objectives, which can include reductions in cycle time, a decrease of incurred costs, and improved customer satisfaction levels.

Having recurring outcomes helps companies analyze processes and figure out whether to make further changes within the notice period. For example, a logistics company reported that the time taken to deliver goods was reduced by 25%, and operational costs went down by 30% after implementing BPR. Such quantifiable figures can provide insight into why BPR should be adopted and why there is a need for upholding evidence-based management.

The role of technology in BPR 

Several tools contribute heavily to BPR. Some of these tools include software for process mapping, analytical tools for data, and solution decomposition.

When integrated into a business process, these tools make operations efficient and promote better decision-making through data. For example, companies tend to be more efficient and minimize adverse human engagement when using automation tools, indicating a fair challenge in business process reengineering.

New paradigm-changing technologies such as artificial intelligence and machine learning are changing the face of BPR, too. There are also great advantages to the analysis of large datasets and trend forecasting regarding improvements in processes.

How BPR synchronizes with business needs 

BPR can only succeed if it is consistent with the organization's business strategy. This helps to ensure the reengineering activities are in tandem with the aspired performance.

As the process is being designed, several factors should be taken into account: how powerful the company would be in its target market, the fierceness of the competition, and how customers will react. For example, in a company focused on improving customer satisfaction, they would concentrate on reengineering the processes that directly affect service and turnaround time.

When the business strategy is taken into consideration, the BPR objective is achieved, and all the goals of the organization will be interlinked, leading to high progressive growth.

How Qntrl supports business process redesign 

Qntrl provides a sturdy platform for organizations considering BPR. Through this, teams can automate work processes, have visibility on processes in real-time, and collaborate across teams in Qntrl’s friendly interface with advanced features and tools.

The system helps companies assess processes for non-value-added activities and create redesigned processes to suit the needs of their users. Qntrl can be a tool for successful business process reengineering to improve efficiency levels and customer satisfaction.

In addition, 70+ prebuilt process templates allow rapid deployment of the system’s main features, eliminating the need for constant process creation efforts and enabling users to concentrate on processes that enhance continuous improvement and strategic goals. This, coupled with advanced reporting and analytics capabilities, enables organizations to adequately evaluate the effectiveness of BPR activities. Sign up for a free demo with Qntrl to implement BPR to your organizational needs.