Business Process Engineering

The purpose of this book is to outline the structure of Business Process Engineering (BPE), its practices, methods, and theory for implementing successful organization restructuring. BPE is the design and implementation of efficient and effective business processes, and the corresponding alignment of enabling information technologies and systems. The editors have assembled the best research on BPE and recreated a structured volume that provides academic researchers and practitioners with a theoretical and practical framework for implementing specific BPE solutions for business and government. Hence, the book covers theoretical efforts towards the creation of new methods in BPE and practical issues that relate to its actual implementation in the real world of business and government. Authors from industry, government, and academia have contributed individual chapters. The emphasis is on methodology that can be replicated. Industry and governmental contributors have provided a synthesis of BPE experiences or individual case studies. In both cases, the work is intended to lead to lessons learned that may be successfully employed by others.
The academically oriented chapters relate BPE methodologies to other forms of organizational change, building on previous research in related areas. The chapters are grouped as follows: Structures for BPE, Model Development, Information Technology for BPE, Tools for BPE, and Case Studies of BPE. The goal of this volume is to present works that clarify the definition of the field and establish factors that lead to success in implementation. The editors’ premise is that the objective of BPE is to bring about organizational improvement by the application of scientific principles and the use of enabling information technologies. This new methodology, founded and nurtured in practice, will evolve into a mature academic field that will involve many diverse academic disciplines. This volume is intended to contribute to that development.