Business Process Reengineering
Part 6 of 6 

Once the process has been documented, it must be validated to make sure that all of the important steps have been included and that the documented process is an accurate representation of the real process. This can be done by either verifying the process with those who actually work with it or by actually following the real process through its various stages. After the process has been documented and verified, it must be then analyzed and characterized.

One way of characterizing a process is to examine every step in the process and assign it to one of four categories: value-adding (it does something that increases value as seen from the perspective of the customer); waste-creating (the activity does not add value); non-value-adding but necessary (something that is needed such as a setup but which does not add value directly) and ? (the status of this activity has yet to be determined). Determining which category to assign each step can be facilitated by the "5 Whys" procedure.

Before leaving this step, it should be noted that we are interested not only in identifying and characterizing the activities but in also identifying the times associated with the various steps. In documenting time, it is often useful

to capture three pieces of information: expected time, optimistic time (how long should it take if everything goes right) and pessimistic time (how long should it take if everything associated with that activity goes wrong). These three points help us to determine the overall reliability of the process. (More information about this phase of analysis can be obtained by contacting the authors directly.)

5. Remedial Action: Now, we can begin to try to improve the process. When trying to improve the process, we are faced by two options: a complete redesign or fine-tuning of the current process. The option we pick is influenced by the information gained during the first step. A complete redesign is best achieved by using a "clean sheet of paper" approach. With fine- tuning, we must deal with the issues of "disposition" and "position." Disposition, which deals with how we will treat every step in the current process, presents us with four options: (I) Keep (we like what we are doing, we like how we are doing it); (2) Eliminate (the activity adds no value and can be dropped); (3) Combine (two or similar steps can be combined to eliminate time); and, (4) Rethink (we like the goal of the activity but not how it is being done). With Position, we are looking at whether we put the activity on the critical path (which affects overall lead time) or on a parallel path.

6. Resistance to Change: Changing processes creates resistance. To overcome this resistance, we can use two tactics: participation (which leads to acceptance and ownership) and time (with enough time, people will accept change).

7. Holding the Gains: Now that we changed the processes, we must prevent any fallback to either old "bad" practices or the old processes. To prevent this, new standards need to established. Training must be increased as well as the development of a new system controls.

With the completion of this last step, the breakthrough has been achieved and the processes changed. Hopefully these changes will have eliminated the gaps that initially triggered BPR. With the set of the new standards, management is now ready to repeat this sequence of events again (to develop better and more effective processes).

BPR is a potentially effective technique available for the firm interested in either developing a fundamental breakthrough by replacing their current processes with newer and more effective processes or in fine-tuning existing processes. To be used effectively, guidelines for its use must be established. What we have done in this presentation is to examine the entire concept of BPR and to develop such needed guidelines. We have also identified some but not all of the tools and techniques that can be used in successfully carrying out a BPR project.

Hopefully, the information presented in this paper will help managers close their own gaps between what they want to achieve with BPR and the process of achieving these goals.