selecting the best strategic practices for business process redesign
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Selecting the best strategicpractices for business
process redesignPayam Hanafizadeh
Department of Industrial Management,School of Management and Accounting, Allameh Tabataba’i University,
Teheran, Iran
Morteza MoosakhaniDepartment of Public Administration, School of Management and Accounting,
Qazvin Islamic Azad University, Qazvin, Iran, and
Javad BakhshiDepartment of Industrial Management,School of Management and Accounting,
Qazvin Islamic Azad University, Qazvin, Iran
Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to present a methodology which defines best strategicpractices for business process redesign (BPR).
Design/methodology/approach – A total of 29 best practices are studied and evaluated from theliterature. The philosophy of TOPSIS (Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution)method is applied in recognizing the alignment of best practices with the organization strategy. Theindicators of cost, time, quality and flexibility are used as the criteria to measure the degree ofalignment of best practices with organization strategy. The proposed method is tested in a case studyof the registration process at a university.
Findings – The recent investment failures in BPR projects show that the relation between bestpractices and organization strategies should be highly considered. It is indicated that process redesigncan meet organization strategies through recognizing and implementing best strategic practices.
Research limitations/implications – Considering the fact that pundits working in the field ofBPR are not accessible, the previous published findings and results have been used in this research.
Practical implications – Owing to the limitations on budget and time, organizations are able toconsider only those best practices which play a critical vote in helping them to achieve their goals. Beststrategic practices list provides managers and business analysts with a precious resource in BPRprojects.
Originality/value – This paper presents a new methodology for introducing best strategic practicesfor BPR. A strategic best practice is a new term in the BPR literature.
Keywords Business process re-engineering, Corporate strategy, Redesign
Paper type Research paper
1. IntroductionAfter presenting the work division principle by Adam Smith and industrial revolutionin developed countries, a new theory, proposed by Hammer and Champy, was studiedby many researchers and was called different names. Among them are.
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at
www.emeraldinsight.com/1463-7154.htm
Businessprocessredesign
609
Business Process ManagementJournal
Vol. 15 No. 4, 2009pp. 609-627
q Emerald Group Publishing Limited1463-7154
DOI 10.1108/14637150910975561
Core process redesign (Heygate, 1993; Rigby, 1993; Kaplan and Murdock, 1991),process innovation (Davenport, 1993), business process redesign (BPR; Davenport andShort, 1990), organizational reengineering (Hammer and Champy, 1993; Lowenthal, 1994),breakpoint BPR ( Johansson et al., 1993), and business restructuring (Talwar, 1993).
BPR mainly aims at creating a process-oriented attitude instead of afunctional-oriented one because the business processes provide companies, notproducts, with long-term success. Successful people in the competitive area presentgood products, not the good products cause success (Hammer and Champy, 1993).
Studies in the case of BPR indicate that the failure rate is very high in such projects(Wu, 2002; Al-Mashari and Zairi, 1999). Several reasons show that most failures aredue to the projects mismanagement (Tinnila, 1995; Al-Mashari and Zairi, 2000; Bergand Pottjewijd, 1997). Generally, BPR initiatives face two challenges (Reijers andMansar, 2005a):
(1) Technical challenge: derives from the difficulty in designing and developing theprocess; if it is adequately met, it provides the current process with fundamentaland dramatic improvement.
(2) Socio-cultural challenge: is the result of the severe organizational effects oninvolved individuals that may lead them to react against the changes.
In order to meet such challenges, different methodologies, practices and tools havebeen presented in various research such as (Kettinger et al., 1997; Valiris and Glykas,1999). One of the proposed practices for encountering technical challenges is thatanalyzers refer to the best practices. The best practices are successful experiencedmethods for facing a special problem that may happen in every setting Reijers andMansar, 2005a, Reijers and Mansar, 2005b, Reijers and Mansar, 2007). Best practicesuse professional methods to cope with the current situation and consequently enhancethe organization productivity.
Although it is suggested that BPR should be pertinent to organization’s goals andstrategies, it does not occur in reality (Wu, 2002). Therefore, it should be attempted toapply those best practices, which align with organization strategies. To achieve such agoal, simulation or practitioners’ work experiences can be exploited to provide a properanalysis of the effects of implementing the best practices on organization components.Finally, the rate of their alignment with strategies can be specified.
Hence, studying and evaluating best practices presented in BPR literature, thisresearch comes up with a methodology for identifying best strategic practices. Owingto the fact that organizations need to produce goods and present services with“low cost”, “high quality”, “high flexibility” and “prompt response to customers’needs”, these four indicators are used to evaluate the effects of implementing bestpractices on business processes (Venkatraman, 1994).
Given the aim mentioned above, this research seeks to answer the followingquestions:
RQ1. Which best practices can be employed to face the technical challenge of BPR?
RQ2. What are the best strategic practices for BPR?
To answer the research questions above, first of all, a review of literature on BPR isdone. In the next step, a methodology for identifying best strategic practices isintroduced. Then, applying such a methodology, registration process of students at
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Qazvin Azad University is studied. Finally, the findings of the research are discussedand analyzed and a conclusion is made.
The schematic representation of the stages of this research is shown in Figure 1.
2. Review of literatureSince the advent of reengineering concept, it has been studied from differentperspectives. The followings are examples which are worth mentioning.
Reengineering implementation methodology (Wastell et al., 1999; Davenport andShort, 1990; Kettinger et al., 1997; Wu, 2002), its relationship with other organizationalapproaches (Currie, 1999; Dickinson, 1997; Green andWayhan, 1996; Makridakis, 1996;Ulbrich, 2006), reengineering and IT (Davenport and Short, 1990; Whitman, 1996),quality management and reengineering (Gingele et al., 2002; Macdonald, 1995; Zairiand Sinclair, 1996), implementation experiences, obstacles and results (Belmiroand Rents, 2000; Guimaraes and Bond, 1996; Maull et al., 2003; Ranganathan andDhaliwal, 2001).
But the important point which should be taken into account here is the differencebetween the concepts of process improvement, redesign and reengineering that isillustrated in Figure 2.
Considering Figure 2, it can be concluded that reengineering, compared to redesign,has a broader domain and involves all reconstruction dimensions of the organization’sprocesses from change management to project management. While process redesign is
Figure 1.Research stages
Recognizingbest practices
Categorizingbest strategic
practices
Evaluatingorganization
strategies
Selecting theprocess
under study
Discussionand
conclusion
Testingthe obtained
results
Figure 2.Differences between
process improvement,redesign andreengineering
Low Expectations of result Dramatic
Short/Low Time and cost to improvement
Source: Macdonald (1995)
Long/High
Low Executive involvement Very high
Smal
lIT
-bas
ed n
eed
Impe
rativ
e
Low
Ris
kH
igh
Min
orD
egre
e of
cha
nge
Rad
ical
Processimprovement
Processredesign
Processreengineering
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seeking for a response to the technical challenge presented in the introduction section,or attempting to somehow make a new process that is preferable to the current processfrom different perspectives, each reengineering process can obviously include one ormore redesign processes (Mansar and Reijers, 2007).
There are several researchers mentioned in the literature who have worked on BPR.Some of them are as follows:
. Al-Mashari and Zairi (1999, 2000) studied the reengineering literature and triedto categorize failure and success factors in their implementation. In thesecond research, they addressed the different definitions of reengineering andresolved the ambiguities around its concepts. Finally, they discussed theintegration between reengineering and total quality management, benchmarkingand change management and presented a conceptual approach toward thecritical role of IT in reengineering.
. Paper, Rodger and Pendharkar (2001) collected organizations’ experiences inreengineering process in the US states and after data analyzing, published themin the form of ten lessons to help those who want to successfully implementreengineering.
. In their study, Ranganathan and Dhaliwal (2001) presented the results ofbusiness process reengineering implementation in Singapore’s companies andidentified the main problems of implementation as the lack of financial andhuman resources, IT internal skill and capacity and a hero to promote the plans.
. Maull et al. (2003) investigated 33 public and private organizations in Englandand analyzed the relationship between different sections and dimensions of areengineering plan and also their relationship with the maturity in implementingthe business process reengineering.
. Hughes et al. (2006), Harders et al.(2006) and Greasley (2004) applied andimplemented reengineering and found out considerable results in e-governmentcenters, operation room in hospitals and road accidents dispatching system.
Few studies have specifically dealt with BPR. In 2005, Mansar and Reijers (2005a)studied best current practices for meeting technical challenges of process redesign andanalyzed these practices, based on their experiences, from cost, quality, time, andflexibility perspectives. In another research done by the same researchers, theyevaluated best practices through experts and analyzers’ questionnaires, identifyingand analyzing ten best practices (Mansar and Reijers, 2007). It is noteworthy that instudies mentioned above the relation between the best practices and strategies oforganization as well as the way they are selected to implement processes have beenneglected.
3. Best practicesReviewing the literature came up with 37 best practices, some of which are notsupported by indicators of cost, quality, time and flexibility. Considering theseindicators, only those with the backgrounds of their effects on processes werepresented. Before presenting the best practices, the important areas and sections inprocess redesign should be mentioned. They can be generally categorized into sixgroups (Mansar and Reijers, 2005b):
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(1) Internal and external customers of business processes.
(2) Products or services of processes.
(3) Business processes from two perspectives:. Operation view. How have the business processes been implemented?
(The number of tasks in an occupation, the relation level between tasks andactivities, tasks’ nature, consistency rate, etc.).
. Behavior view. When have the business processes been implemented?(Tasks’ sequence, composition, scheduling, etc.).
(4) Participants in business processes:. Organization structure (elements, roles, users, groups, units, etc.).. Organization population (individuals, representatives that have the
authority over tasks’ execution and relation between tasks).
(5) The information made or used by business processes.
(6) The technology used by processes, and finally the external environment (exceptcustomers) can be referred to. In Figure 3, an illustration of BPR implementationframework has been presented.
Therefore, from among 37 best practices, 29 best practices were selected which areranked in Table II and are defined and evaluated using four indicators of cost, quality,
Figure 3.BPR implementation
framework
External environment
Customers
Products
Organizationstructure andpopulation
Information Technology
Business process
Operation view Behavior view
Source: Mansar and Reijers (2005b)
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time and flexibility. It is worth mentioning that the study done by Mansar and Reijers,was used to evaluate the best practices (Mansar and Reijers, 2005a, 2005b, 2007).
If an indicator is displayed by2 , it signifies the negative effect, if byA, it shows theneutral effect and if shown byþ , it symbolizes the positive effect on that indicator. Forinstance, the best practice of “control relocation” positively influences quality(improves the quality), negatively impacts on cost (increases the cost) and has a neutraleffect on time and flexibility.
4. Recognizing best strategic practicesIn order to achieve their missions and goals, organizations adopt various strategies.Due to the application of general strategies in most public and private organizations,three strategies of cost leadership, prompt response and differentiation are used forcategorizing the best practices (Hambrick and Fredrickson, 2001; Porter, 1985).Analyzing strategies is done using cost, time, quality and flexibility indicators asshown in Table I.
Considering the nature of strategies, analyzing their content, and adapting them tothe best practices, the best practices aligned with each strategy can be identified(Table II).
Here, using TOPSIS philosophy, the closeness or distance of best practices toorganization strategies are identified and categorized. In this method, in addition toconsidering the distance of one best practice from main ideal model of strategies(Table III), its distance from strategies’ subsidiary ideal point (Table V) is taken intoaccount as well. That is, selected best practice should have the least distance frommain ideal model, and in the next stage, the least distance from subsidiary ideal model.The algorithm of the mentioned method is as follows.
4.1 First stepThe main model of strategies should be developed considering the indicators of cost,quality, time and flexibility that should express main requirements of the strategies(Table III). In fact, the main focus of strategies is to take these indicators into account.In this research, three spectrums of increase, decrease and neutral are used to evaluatethe indicators. For example, according to Tables I and III, key indicators of promptresponse strategy are time and flexibility, so the aim of this strategy is to decrease thetime and increase the flexibility. It is also possible to consider cost and quality asneutral factors.
Table III is an illustration of core selective indicators.
4.2 Second stepDistance of best practices with main ideal model is assessed and the alignment ofindicators is scored þ 1 and the non-alignment of indicators is scored 21 and finally
Cost leadershipstrategy Prompt response strategy Differentiation strategy
Core selectiveindicator
Based on cost Based on capacity, prompt responseand flexibility
Based on productdevelopment skills
Source: Chou and Chang (2007)Table I.Analyzing strategies
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Framew
ork
components
Bestpractice
Definition
Cost
Tim
eQuality
Flexibility
Suppliers
Custom
erControl
relocation
Movingtowardsthecustom
ers’
control
2A
þA
Klein
(Kettinger
etal.,1997)
Contact
reduction
Reducingphysicalcontact
with
custom
ersandthirdparties
2þ
þA
Ham
mer
andCham
py–Buzacott(Berio
and
Vernadat,2001;Guim
araesandBond,1996)
Integration
Mergingwithcustom
ersand
suppliers’businessprocesses
þþ
A2
Kelin-PeppardandRow
land(Kettinger
etal.,
1997;Maull
etal.,2003)
Process
operation
view
Order
types
Determiningthetasksthat
arerelated
inan
order
anddesigningnew
processes
ifnecessary
þþ
22
Ham
mer
andCham
py–RuppandRussell–
PeppardandRow
land–BergandPottjew
ijd
(Guim
araesandBond,1996;Maull
etal.,2003;
BelmiroandRents,2000;Ranganathan
and
Dhaliwal,2001)
Task
elim
ination
Eliminatingunnecessary
tasksfrom
aprocess
(thetaskswithnoadded
value
forcustom
ers)
þþ
2A
PeppardandRow
land–van
der
Aalst
and
van
Hee
(Berio
andVernadat,2001;Maull
etal.,2003;BelmiroandRents,2000;Sarmad
etal.,1998)
Order-based
work
Eliminatingthebatch-processingand
periodicactivitiesfrom
aprocess
2þ
AA
Reijers
andMansar(M
ansarandReijers,
2007)
Triage
Puttingapartof
ageneraltask
intw
oor
moresubstitute
duties
ormerging
twoor
moresubstitute
duties
inone
general
task
þþ
þ2
(Kettinger
etal.,1997;BelmiroandRents,
2000;Sarmad
etal.,1998;Davis
etal.,2006)
Task
composition
Synthesizingsm
alltasksin
composite
tasksandbreakingdow
nbig
tasks
into
smallpractical
ones
þþ
þ2
Ham
mer
andCham
py–Reijers
andGoverde
–van
der
etal.(Guim
araesandBond,1996;
Sarmad
etal.,1998;PoyssickandHannaford,
1996)
(con
tinued)
Table II.A list of best practices
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Framew
ork
components
Bestpractice
Definition
Cost
Tim
eQuality
Flexibility
Suppliers
Process
behavior
view
Resequencing
Taskrelocation
totheproper
areas
þþ
AA
Klein
(Kettinger
etal.,1997)
Knock-out
Recognizingtheknock-outsections
andmaintainingthem
þ2
AA
van
der
Aalst
(SeidmannandSundararajan,
1997)
Parallelism
Consideringwhether
taskscanbe
donein
aprocess
inparallel
2þ
AA
van
der
Aalst
(Berio
andVernadat,2001;
BelmiroandRents,2000;Ranganathan
and
Dhaliwal,2001;SeidmannandSundararajan,
1997)
Exception
Businessprocess
designingfortypical
ordersandseparatingtheexception
ordersfrom
thenormal
flow
Aþ
þ2
PoyssickandHannaford–Ham
mer
and
Cham
py(Guim
araesandBond,1996;Peppard
andRow
land,1995)
Organization
structure
Order
assignment
Lettingtheem
ployeesdothestages
ofsingleordersthem
selves
ifthey
have
therequired
ability
A2
þ2
RuppandRussell-van
der
Aalstandvan
Hee-
Ham
mer
andCham
py–Reijers
andGoverde
(Guim
araesandBond,1996;Ranganathan
andDhaliwal,2001;Sarmad
etal.,1998;
PoyssickandHannaford,1996)
Flexible
assignment
Resourceassignmentin
away
that
maxim
izes
theflexibilityforthenear
future
Aþ
þA
van
der
Aalst
andvan
Hee
(Sarmad
etal.,
1998)
Centralization
Dispersingtheresources
ifthey
are
geographically
centralized.
2þ
Aþ
van
der
Aalst
andvan
Hee
(Sarmad
etal.,
1998)
Split
responsibilities
Avoidingsubmittingthetasksto
the
individualsof
other
units
AA
þ2
RuppandRussell–BergandPottjew
ijd
(BelmiroandRents,2000;Ranganathan
and
Dhaliwal,2001)
(con
tinued)
Table II.
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Framew
ork
components
Bestpractice
Definition
Cost
Tim
eQuality
Flexibility
Suppliers
Custom
erteam
sEmployingteam
sexceptdepartm
ental
workersto
completely
handlespecial
orders
A2
þ2
Ham
mer
andCham
py–Peppardand
Row
land-BergandPottjew
ijd(Guim
araes
andBond,1996;Maull
etal.,2003;Belmiro
andRents,2000)
Numerical
involvem
ent
orparticipation
Minim
izingthenumber
ofunits,
groupsandindividualsinvolved
ina
businessprocess
2A
þ2
RuppandRussell–BergandPottjew
ijd–
Ham
mer
andCham
py(Guim
araesandBond,
1996;BelmiroandRents,2000;Ranganathan
andDhaliwal,2001)
Casemanager
Employingaresponsiblepersonfor
handlinganyorder
(thispersonis
process
manager)
2A
þA
van
der
Aalst
andvan
Hee
–Ham
mer
and
Cham
py–Buzacott(Berio
andVernadat,
2001;Guim
araesandBond,1996;Sarmad
etal.,1998)
Organization
population
Extra
resources
Increasingtheresources,ifthe
capacityisnot
enough
2þ
Aþ
BergandPottjew
ijd–van
Hee
etal.(Belmiro
andRents,2000;Tinnila,1995)
Specialization
generalization
Providingmanygeneral
and
professional
resources
22
þ2
RuppandRussellSeidmann&
Sundararajan
(Ranganathan
andDhaliwal,2001;Reijers
andGoverde,1998)
Empow
erEntrustingmostdecision-m
akingsto
employeesandreducingthemiddle
managem
ent
þþ
2A
RuppandRussellHam
mer
andCham
py
SeidmannandSundararajan
(Guim
araesand
Bond,1996;Ranganathan
andDhaliwal,2001;
PeppardandRow
land,1995;Reijers
and
Goverde,1998)
(con
tinued)
Table II.
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617
Framew
ork
components
Bestpractice
Definition
Cost
Tim
eQuality
Flexibility
Suppliers
Inform
ation
Control
addition
Controllingthecompleteness(entirety)
andaccuracy
ofinputsandcontrolling
theoutputs
beforedistributingto
custom
ers
þ2
þA
PoyssickandHannafordHam
mer
and
Cham
pyBuzacott(Berio
andVernadat,2001;
Guim
araesandBond,1996;Peppardand
Row
land,1995)
Buffering
Insteadof
receivinginform
ationfrom
anexternal
resource,makeitsafe
by
up-dating
2þ
AA
Reijers
andMansar(M
ansarandReijers,
2007)
Technology
Task
automation
Automatingthetaskswillincrease
the
speedof
handlingtheorderswith
lower
cost
andbetterresult
2þ
þA
Ham
mer
andCham
py–Peppardand
Row
land-BergandPottjew
ijd(Guim
araes
andBond,1996;Maull
etal.,2003;Belmiro
andRents,2000)
Integral
technology
Effortsto
omitphysicalconstraintson
aprocess
byapplyingnew
technologies
2þ
AA
PeppardandRow
land-BergandPottjew
ijd–
van
der
Aalstandvan
Hee
(Maull
etal.,2003;
BelmiroandRents,2000;Sarmad
etal.,1998)
External
environment
Trusted
party
Insteadof
makingdecisionsbased
onyourow
ninform
ation,use
theresults
obtained
bycreditablesections
þþ
22
Reijers
andMansar(M
ansarandReijers,
2007)
Outsourcing
Outsourcingapartof
orthewholeof
abusinessprocess
þþ
22
Ham
mer
andCham
py(Kettinger,1997;
Guim
araesandBond,1996;Peppardand
Row
land,1995)
Interfacing
standardized
relationswithcustom
ers
andpartners
þþ
þA
PoyssickandHannaford(Guim
araesand
Bond,1996;PeppardandRow
land,1995)
Notes:þ
,Positiveeffect;A,neutral
effect;2,negativeeffect
Table II.
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scores are added up. Then, positive scores are ranked from high to low. In the nextstep, best practices are categorized. Table IV indicates the alignment rate between bestindicators and strategies using core indicators.
4.3 Third stepMaking the ideal subsidiary model of strategies using indicators mentioned earliershows the ideal situation after satisfying the main wants of strategies. For example,after meeting its needs of decreasing production time and increasing the flexibility inorganization system, the prompt response strategy is desired to have the best qualityand least cost. Table V indicates the subsidiary selective indicators.
4.4 Fourth stepIn this step, the alignment of best practices with subsidiary ideal model is assessedand similar measures as in the second step are taken. Table VI demonstrates thealignment rate again between the six best practices and strategies using subsidiaryindicators.
Best practice
StrategyContact
reduction Exception Outsourcing
Taskelimination
centralizationKnock-out
Cost leadership –1 –1
Prompt response –1
Differentiation –1
+1
+1 +2
+1
+1 +1
+2 +2
Table IV.Alignment rate between
best practices andstrategies using coreindicators in six bestpractices as examples
IndicatorsStrategies Cost Time Quality Flexibility
Cost leadership # – – –Prompt response – # – "Differentiation – # " –
Notes: " , increase; # , decrease; – , neutralTable III.
Core selective indicators
IndicatorsStrategy Cost Time Quality Flexibility
Cost leadership – # " "Prompt response # – " –Differentiation # – – "
Table V.Subsidiary selective
indicators
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4.5 Fifth stepLast but not the least, given the results of the second step, best practices with positivescores are ranked from high to low and the results of the third step (the biggestpositive number of subsidiary score) is used to prioritize the best practices when thescores are equal.
Considering above evaluations, best practices’ prioritization is as follows:. Cost leadership: tasks elimination ! outsourcing ! knock-out.. Prompt response: centralization ! tasks elimination.. Differentiation: contact reduction ! exception ! centralization.
Using the above algorithm, best strategic practices are categorized into three categoriesand then into three priorities based on the alignment rate in Figure 4.
5. Case studyUsing obtained results, the registration process at the Azad University of Qazvin isevaluated according to the stages indicated in Figure 5. It is noteworthy that across-functional team was formed and the registration process, based on evaluationdone, was identified as one of the most critical processes; therefore, it was chosen to beredesigned.
5.1 Data collection methodAs mentioned in previous stages, library study was used to collect the best practices; tomodel and to recognize the process, the techniques of observation and interview witheducation administrators and staff of the university were used.
5.2 Data collection toolsThe tool utilized in this research is System Flowchart that is used due to its simplicityin indicating the process. Figure 5 illustrates process redesign methodology.
5.3 Organization strategySurveys showed that the main strategy of the Azad University of Qazvin isdifferentiation.
5.4 Collecting and categorizing best strategic practicesConsidering the Section 3 of this research, 29 best practices were evaluated. Thesepractices had been collected from studies and were related to the general strategies ofthe organization. Finally, 12 best practices were selected for each strategy.
Best practice
StrategyContactreduction Exception Outsourcing
Taskelimination Centralization Knock-out
Cost leadership þ1 þ1 21 – þ2 21Prompt response – þ1 – – 21 þ1Differentiation 21 21 – þ1 – þ1
Table VI.Alignment rate betweenbest practices andstrategies usingsubsidiary indicators
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5.5 Current situation recognitionThe registration process at the Azad University of Qazvin is evaluated in Figure 6 andall its stages are defined. In brief, the main problems of the registration process are asfollows:
. The registration process takes a long time, so that non-local students waste atleast a workday on it.
. The registration fee must be paid at some places located at the university. Thus,it causes long lines and takes a long time to pay the fee.
Figure 4.Best strategic practices
Organization strategies
Differentiation Prompt response Cost leadership
1- Interfacing
2- Flexible assignment
3- Task composition
4- Triage
Firs
t pri
ority
1- Centralization
2- Outsourcing
3- Interfacing
1- Interfacing
2- Re-composition
3- Triage
4- Task composition
Seco
nd p
rior
ity
5- Task automation
6- Exception
7- Contact reduction
4- Re-composition
5- Flexible assignment
6- Contact reduction
7- Task elimination
8- Empower
9- Task automation
5- Empower
6- Integration
7- Control addition
8- Task elimination
Thi
rd p
rior
ity
8- Re-composition
9- Extra resources
10- Integration
11- Case manager
12- Control relocation
10- Integral technology
11- Parallelism
12- Order-based work
9- Order types
10- Trusted party
11- Outsourcing
12- Knock-out
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. The students are exhausted by walking the long distances and locations atbetween different parts of university.
. The costs of the university go up because the university has to prepare specialplaces for registration and to pay a salary increment to the personnel.
. The possibility of committing errors in the selection system of credit courses isheightened because they are selected by operators.
5.6 Selecting best strategic practicesConsidering the problems of current process and also the university strategy, the beststrategic practices for process redesign are shown in Figure 7.
Therefore, after expert evaluations of each problem, following decisions were made:. Since the registration process is time-consuming and is done during the vacation
between two terms, there should be a decrease in students’ visit to the universityin person (contact reduction).
. For students’ convenience, the number of banks should be increased so that theycould pay the fee in desired regions (external resources, and centralization).
. Course selection by operators is one of the main causes of errors, thus, studentsshould be allowed to choose their courses by themselves (control relocation).
Figure 5.Process redesignmethodology
WFM + B.P 1 WFM + B.P 2
WFM + B.P n
Identifying organization strategies
Collecting and categorizing best strategicpractices
Current situation recognition using workflow model (WFM)
Selecting best strategic practices
Business process redesign model
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Generally, other best practices that could help the registration process are: (taskautomation, exception and task composition).
Therefore, process redesign work team decided to design a web site (a web-basedinformation system) through which the students could do the entire registrationprocess. So, the contact with the university and the registration period were reduced.Before redesigning the process, students usually needed to take 3-4 hours to completetheir registration process (if they were locals), but when the process was redesigned,
Figure 7.The flowchart
of enrollment processat university afterbeing redesigned
Uni
vers
ityw
ebsi
teC
ount
ry's
bank
sE
duca
tion
Going to the bankand getting
deposit slip thebank receipt
Visiting thewebsite and
receivinginformation about
fixed fee
Payingthe fixed
fee
Registeringbank draft
and financialconfirmation
Completingcourse
selectionMonitoring theselected courses
Courseselection
conformation
Gettinginformation
about thevariable fee
Going to thebank and gettingdeposit slip the
bank receipt
Payingthe
variablefee
Draftregistration
Taking theprintout of
course selection
Figure 6.The flowchart
of registration processat the university
before redesigning
Publ
icat
ions
Com
pute
rB
ank
of
univ
ersi
tyFi
nanc
ial
issu
esE
duca
tion
Receivingthe presented
lessons
Taking theprintout of
fixed tuition fee
Going andgetting
deposit slipbank receipt
Payingthe fixed
tuition fee
Going andgiving the
deposit paiddraft
Financialregistration
andconfirmation
Filing in theform ofcourse
selection
Beingconfirmed bythe head ofdepartment
Have thelessons beenconfirmed?
Registeringthe selected
courses
Taking theprintout ofselecting
thecourses
Has courseselection been
completedcorrectly and successfully?
Going andgetting bank
slips
Paying thevariable fee
Going andgiving the
deposit slips
Financialregistration
andconfirmation
Taking theprintout of
courseselection
Enteringstudentnumber
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the registration time was reduced to less than 1 hour. Meanwhile, the studentsthemselves select the courses, which put them in control. Furthermore, in cooperationwith one of the national banks, students can now pay their tuition fee anytime,everywhere and with the least wasted time, when compared with that of paying fee atthe university (Figure 7).
6. ConclusionIn this research, a methodologywas proposed to recognize the best strategic practices inBPR. This methodology uses TOPSIS philosophy in recognizing the alignment ofpracticeswith the strategy. The indicators of cost, time, quality and flexibilitywere usedas the criteria to select best strategic practice. Also, using the proposedmethodology, thebest strategic practices for three strategies of cost leadership, prompt response anddifferentiation were identified from among 29 best practices. The proposed method wastested in a case study of the registration process at a university. It was indicated that theprocess redesign fulfill organization strategies through recognizing and implementingthe best strategic practices. In this paper, to identify the effects of implementing the bestpractices on organization, four indicators with three spectrums were used, but otherindicators such as trustworthiness complexity, etc. with a wide range of spectrums canbe employed to analyze the method. As suggestions for further research, the degree ofchanges which can be caused by each and every of the best practices in the organization,measuring these the degree of changes and the organization processes’ capability of canbe taken into account.
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Corresponding authorPayam Hanafizadeh can be contacted at: hanafizadeh@gmail.com
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