Understanding Business Process Management: Implications for Theory and Practice

Smart, P. A.; Maddern, Harry; Maull, Roger

doi:10.1111/j.1467-8551.2008.00594.x

Cited by 116 publications

(174 citation statements)

References 68 publications

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“…Pritchard and Armistead (1999) identify the link between BPM deployment and business strategy as one of the key considerations for successful BPM implementation. These views are consistent with Smart et al (2009), who note that the articulation of a strategic intent to focus on processes has been identified by several researchers (Lee and Dale, 1998;Grover and Kettinger, 2000;Bateman and Rich, 2003;Meadows and Merali, 2003).…”

Section: Process Design In the Bpm Literaturesupporting

confidence: 74%

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Process design principles in service firms: Universal or context dependent? A literature review and new research directions

Ponsignon¹,

Smart²,

Maull³

2012

Total Quality Management & Business Excellence

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The aim of this article is to assess whether process design principles derived from best practices are universally applicable to service organisations or context dependent. This is achieved through a comprehensive review of the Business Process Management (BPM) and Operations Management (OM) literatures. Our comparison of the existing bodies of knowledge in these disciplines reveals major inconsistencies in how the topic of process design in service environments is addressed. Drawing on the more mature, contingencyoriented OM literature we challenge the BPM discipline which prescribes that process design principles derived from best practices are universally applicable irrespective of the context in which the service organisation operates. The results strongly suggest that in the business process design area one size does not fit all service organisations and that some design principles fit better under certain contextual conditions. We then use these findings to 2 develop a contingency conceptual framework and associated research propositions linking the firm's service strategy context to the use of particular business process design principles. This extends existing theory and provides a platform for future process design research in service organisations that is more closely aligned with the needs of practitioners.

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Section: Process Design In the Bpm Literaturesupporting

confidence: 74%

“…In recent years, a plethora of process management approaches, which can be positioned under a generic Business Process Management (BPM) umbrella, have attracted and sustained the attention of many businesses (Grover et al, 1993;Forsberg et al, 1999;Smart et al, 2009).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Process design principles in service firms: Universal or context dependent? A literature review and new research directions

Ponsignon¹,

Smart²,

Maull³

2012

Total Quality Management & Business Excellence

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“…The overrepresentation of the financial services industry in the sample (29%) is in line with reports by Gartner 4 and Datamonitor 5 showing significant interest of the banking sector in process management. Similarly, having a slight majority (52%) of very large companies generating over $1bn in revenues in the sample is not surprising, as process management is more likely to be embraced by large organisations trying to improve sub-optimal units (Smart et al 2009). The characteristics of the study participants and the organisations they represent are shown in Table 2. <Insert Table 2 about here> We obtained a total of 62 responses, of which we retained 48 for the analysis phase.…”

Section: Study Participantsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The importance of the process paradigm is pointed out by Grover and Kettinger (2000, 16): "process thinking has become mainstream", and by Fowler (2003, 138): "the issue of process has now achieved equal status with strategy and organisation theory as a concern for debate and analysis at the highest level within organisations". Moreover, the framework articulated by Smart et al (2009) emphasises the need for a process mindset to realise improvements. Business process management (BPM) and other process-focused improvement philosophies have been equally embraced by manufacturing and service organisations.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Four archetypes of process improvement: a Q-methodological study

Ponsignon

Maull

Smart

2013

International Journal of Production Research

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This paper explores the process improvement approaches of organisations. It seeks to identify process redesign principles and the combinations of these principles that are used successfully in industry. We use Q-methodology to explore the viewpoints of a range of highly-experienced process experts about the success of 16 improvement practices. Qmethodology enables the examination of the similarities and differences in the success of the improvement principles used by organisations in order to inform archetypes of process improvement. Overall, our findings suggest that process improvement is determined through the application of two foundational principles combined with one of four archetypes. 'Remove non-value-adding tasks' and 're-sequence tasks' are described as foundational principles of process improvement, whilst outsourcing needs to be approached with caution. Furthermore, we articulate four distinctive archetypes comprising unique configurations of improvement principles that can be used to redesign operational processes. Based on this evidence we propose a typology of process improvement. This work suggests that rather than adopting generic improvement frameworks, managers should consult the typology to determine the archetype in closest proximity to their specific requirements. This study has several limitations including the small number of items populating the concourse and the fact that implementation problems are not taken into account.

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“…Process owners are the most visible difference between process oriented and traditional organizations (Hammer & Stanton, 1999) and are crucial to the effectiveness of process orientation (Smart et al, 2009;Reijers & Peeters, 2010). They are viewed as the champions of process and take overall responsibility for process performance being central in interfacing cross-functional processes.…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Toward a Business Process Owner Competency Framework

Garbutt

Rudman

Seymour

2017

SACJ

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Process owners are vital to the establishment and functioning of process oriented organizations. However, there is a paucity of understanding regarding the tasks process owners should undertake and what competencies they require. In this study, sets of process owner competencies and process owner tasks emerged from interviews with executives from three financial services organizations in South Africa. The findings were compared to the BPTrends report “State of the Business Process Management Market 2016”. Common themes were identified and validated against recent literature. Based on the validated themes a business process owner competency framework was developed and discussed. The framework shows that business process owners require competencies in core business process management, strategic alignment, determining organizational goals, governance, documentation, training, and systemic thinking. The competencies and tasks identified provide a practical contribution to practitioners and recruiters in the field, while the framework adds a theoretical contribution to the field of business process management.

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Understanding Business Process Management: Implications for Theory and Practice

Cited by 116 publications

References 68 publications

Process design principles in service firms: Universal or context dependent? A literature review and new research directions

Process design principles in service firms: Universal or context dependent? A literature review and new research directions

Four archetypes of process improvement: a Q-methodological study

Toward a Business Process Owner Competency Framework

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