A Critical Evaluation and Framework of Business Process Improvement Methods

The redesign of business processes has a huge potential in terms of reducing costs and throughput times, as well as improving customer satisfaction. Despite rapid developments in the business process management discipline during the last decade, a comprehensive overview of the options to methodologically support a team to move from as-is process insights to to-be process alternatives is lacking. As such, no safeguard exists that a systematic exploration of the full range of redesign possibilities takes place by practitioners. Consequently, many attractive redesign possibilities remain unidentified and the improvement potential of redesign initiatives is not fulfilled. This systematic literature review establishes a comprehensive methodological framework, which serves as a catalog for process improvement use cases. The framework contains an overview of all the method options regarding the generation of process improvement ideas. This is established by identifying six key methodological decision areas, e.g. the human actors who can be invited to generate these ideas or the information that can be collected prior to this act. This framework enables practitioners to compose a well-considered method to generate process improvement ideas themselves. Based on a critical evaluation of the framework, the authors also offer recommendations that support academic researchers in grounding and improving methods for generating process improvement ideas. Next to the framework and its critical evaluation, this review investigates the research procedures of the studies that were used to create the framework. Related to this investigation, academic researchers can find additional guidance regarding procedures for building and evaluating new methods

Understanding the Costs of Business Process Management Technology

Providing effective IT support for business processes has become crucial for enterprises to stay competitive in their market. Business processes must be defined, configured, implemented, enacted, monitored and continuously adapted to changing situations. Process life cycle support and continuous process improvement have therefore become critical success factors in enterprise computing. In response to this need, a variety of process support paradigms, process specification standards, process management tools, and supporting methods have emerged. Summarized under the term Business Process Management (BPM), they have become a success-critical instrument for improving overall business performance. However, introducing BPM approaches in enterprises is associated with significant costs. Though existing economic-driven IT evaluation and software cost estimation approaches have received considerable attention during the last decades, it is difficult to apply them to BPM projects. In particular, they are unable to take into account the dynamic evolution of BPM projects caused by the numerous technological, organizational and project-specific factors influencing them. The latter, in turn, often lead to complex and unexpected cost effects in BPM projects making even rough cost estimations a challenge. What is needed is a comprehensive approach enabling BPM professionals to systematically investigate the costs of BPM projects. This chapter takes a look at both known and often unknown cost factors in BPM projects, shortly discusses existing IT evaluation and software cost estimation approaches with respect to their suitability for BPM projects, and finally introduces the EcoPOST framework. EcoPOST utilizes evaluation models to describe the interplay of technological, organizational, and project-specific BPM cost factors as well as simulation concepts to unfold the dynamic behavior and costs of BPM projects

Developing Risk Management Mechanism at Fat-and-Oil Industry Enterprises

The aim of the article is consideration of questions associated with the risk management mechanism formation at the Ukrainian fat-and-oil industry enterprises, modern scientific publications on this topical subject and developing risk management mechanism for fat-and-oil industry enterprises in Ukraine. It has been determined the principles of risk management. It has been offered the risk management procedure at the level of the fat-and-oil industry enterprises, which includes the following stages: identification and evaluation of risks, development and analysis of risk management methods, choice of risk management methods, application of the selected methods, monitoring of the results and risk management system improvement. It has been developed the risk management mechanism of fat-and-oil industry enterprises, which allows to distinguish the main components of risk management and to increase their overall efficiency, as well as to facilitate understanding of the risk management mechanism essence and structure, which, in turn, reveals the direction for its improvement

Enterprise information security policy assessment - an extended framework for metrics development utilising the goal-question-metric approach

Effective enterprise information security policy management requires review and assessment activities to ensure information security policies are aligned with business goals and objectives. As security policy management involves the elements of policy development process and the security policy as output, the context for security policy assessment requires goal-based metrics for these two elements. However, the current security management assessment methods only provide checklist types of assessment that are predefined by industry best practices and do not allow for developing specific goal-based metrics. Utilizing theories drawn from literature, this paper proposes the Enterprise Information Security Policy Assessment approach that expands on the Goal-Question-Metric (GQM) approach. The proposed assessment approach is then applied in a case scenario example to illustrate a practical application. It is shown that the proposed framework addresses the requirement for developing assessment metrics and allows for the concurrent undertaking of process-based and product-based assessment. Recommendations for further research activities include the conduct of empirical research to validate the propositions and the practical application of the proposed assessment approach in case studies to provide opportunities to introduce further enhancements to the approach

Realising benefits in primary healthcare infrastructures

Purpose: This paper focuses upon the requirements to manage change, tangible and intangible benefits in a joint approach to deliver outputs on time, to quality and cost without failing to realise the benefits of the change. The aim of the paper is to demonstrate the need for benefits driven programme/project management as well as the importance of identifying the stakeholders’ level of involvement and contribution throughout the process, and manage their expectations. Design/methodology/approach: The methodology used is based on an action research approach, combining findings from a literature review and case studies within UK’s primary healthcare sector. Findings: Findings demonstrate development of a Benefits Realisation (BeReal) approach in healthcare through looking at case studies taking place within UK’s primary and acute healthcare sector Research limitations/implications: The framework development is based upon theoretical evidence and further research is needed to test and validate its robustness. Originality/value: The application of Benefits Realisation and Management in developing and delivering primary healthcare facilities. Keywords: Benefits management, Benefits realisation, healthcare infrastructures, process and LIF

Trends in quality management research in higher education institutions

The purpose of this study is to determine the state of research in quality management in higher education institutions based on a review of the academic literature. The aim is to provide universities with the best evidence for informing their focus and models for quality improvement. Despite quality’s role growing in importance as universities strive to compete in an increasingly underfunded market for students and research funds the review shows that current research is limited in volume and scope. To ensure the widest coverage in our systematic literature review we use three databases: ScienceDirect, ABI/Inform, and Emerald. The findings show that the three most common topics are quality management implementation issues, quality management models, techniques and tools, and quality management dimensions. The key quality management enabling dimensions found are: people management, process management and information and analysis, while the results dimension is predominantly focused on an understanding of stakeholders’ requirements and feedback on their perceptions of performance. We find in this literature that students are discussed as both end customers as graduates and participants in the learning process who have views on their experience. Also provided is an analysis that shows popular journal outlets, research methodologies used and country focus. The paper concludes with recommendations for the development of quality management for universities, and a future research agenda. This article is the first literature of research in quality management in Higher Education Institutions following the model used in previous literature reviews on quality management and operations management

The sweet spot in sustainability: a framework for corporate assessment in sugar manufacturing

The assessment of corporate sustainability has become an increasingly important topic, both within academia and in industry. For manufacturing companies to conform to their commitments to sustainable development, a standard and reliable measurement framework is required. There is, however, a lack of sector-specific and empirical research in many areas, including the sugar industry. This paper presents an empirically developed framework for the assessment of corporate sustainability within the Thai sugar industry. Multiple case studies were conducted, and a survey using questionnaires was also employed to enhance the power of generalisation. The developed framework is an accurate and reliable measurement instrument of corporate sustainability, and guidelines to assess qualitative criteria are put forward. The proposed framework can be used for a company’s self-assessment and for guiding practitioners in performance improvement and policy decision-maki

A supplier selection strategy within the Malaysian telecommunications industry

The telecommunication industry in Malaysia has grown rapidly over the last 15 years, with effective supply chain management becoming increasing important within the sector. A multitude of providers and part owned Malaysian government companies, vendors and suppliers are involved in generating and creating value-adding products and services within this sector (across wireless, wireline, broadband business and consumer lines of business). This paper describes key challenges facing a major telecoms service provider in Malaysia with regards to drivers involved in the overall procurement and supplier selection with regards to components of performance management, decision-making, selection techniques, quality and cost management, procurement policy and procurement ethics. This paper further focuses on defining and detailing research currently being undertaken to develop a framework for identifying supplier selection drivers that are inherent within the sector and suggests a research approach to investigate and develop strategies for supplier selection for the telecommunications industry in Malaysia