BPM

(2) Interrelated activities

(3) Intrafunctional or cross-functional (4) Purpose or value for customer (5) Resource use

(6) Repeatability

A detailed introduction of these components is not the purpose of this study.

Readers may refer to Klara Palmberg’s article “Exploring Process Management:

are there any widespread models and definitions?” for more details. Palmberg provided a condensed process definition including all six components in his paper stating that business process is “a horizontal sequence of activities that transforms an input (need) to an output (result) to meet the needs of customers or stakeholders”

(Palmberg, 2009). For the purpose of this research, business process is considered as defined by Palmberg (2009), since this definition includes the process providing value to the “internal customer,” which is the main concern of this research.

2.2. BPM

BPM is a method to manage horizontal sequences of activities within an organization. It is widely accepted that BPM has its roots in three academic fields:

Total Quality Management (TQM), Business Process Reengineering (BPR) and Information Technology (IT) (Harmon, 2010; Jeston &Nelis, 2008; Jurisch, Palka, Wolf, &Krcmar, 2013; Roeser &Kern, 2015). Similar to business process, BPM has various meanings among the articles. In this section, the definition of BPM is first reviewed, followed by its origins to get a better understanding of BPM (i.e.,

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what is BPM?). The status of BPM is then reviewed (Where are we now?). An overview of BPM is shown in Figure 3.

2.2.1. Definition of BPM

BPM was defined differently in the literature (Roeser &Kern, 2015); hence, it means different things to different people (Buh, Kovačič, &Indihar Štemberger, 2015). Some define it vaguely (Hammer, 2002; Skrinjar &Trkman, 2013).

However, BPM is considered a management discipline (Aalst, 2013; ABPMP 2013), or a combination of tools and discipline (Hung, 2006; Palmberg, 2009).

Table 2 lists some BPM definitions in the last decade. In this paper, BPM is defined as a set of tools and discipline that aim to improve the business process and to integrate the whole organization in a permanent and continuous manner (ABPMP, 2013; Palmberg, 2009). This definition captures the main characteristics of BPM

Figure 3. An overview of BPM adapted from Harmon (2010)

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that can be discovered among different researchers: “continuous improvement,”

and a, “set of tools and discipline.”

Table 2

Definitions of Business Process Management

Author/s (Year) Business Process Management Definition Hammer (2002) A structured approach to performance improvement

that centers on the disciplined design and careful execution of a company’s end-to-end business process.

Hung (2006) An integrated management philosophy and set of practices that includes incremental change and radical change in business process, and emphasizes continuous improvement.

Palmberg (2009) Both a set of tools and techniques for improving processes and a method of integrating the whole organization and it needs to be understood by all employees.

ABPMP (2013) A management discipline that treats business processes as assets. It presumes that organizational objectives can be achieved through the definition, engineering, control and dedication to continuous improvement of business process.

Aalst (2013) The discipline that combines knowledge from information technology and knowledge from management science and applies this to operational business processed.

Skrinjar & Trkman (2013) A structured, analytical, cross-functional, continuous improvement of processes.

2.2.2. The Origins of BPM

According to Harmon (2010), there was a consensus that the concept of BPM originated from Total Quality Management (TQM), Business Process

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Reengineering (BPR), and Information Technology (IT).

TQM aims to improve the existing process by eliminating waste and automating non-value added actions on a continuous basis. This approach has its limitation (Hammer, 1990, 2010). Hammer (2002) said that “no matter how hard people work; they cannot exceed the capability of the process as it has been designed. Continuous improvement requires an improved design.” In such circumstances, the fundamental problem lies in the faulty design of the process (Hammer, 2010). Therefore, the concept of Business Process Reengineering (BPR) arose in the 1990s (Davenport &Short, 1990; Hammer, 1990; Hammer &Champy, 1993). BPR Proponents believe that companies need to break from the old way of doing business so that they can fit in a rapid changing environment (Hammer, 1990). However, even though Hammer and Davenport provided successful practices in their articles, Champy (1995) discovered that 70% of BPR programs failed. Despite the high failure rate, there is a consensus that companies can still benefit from a BPR program if it is implemented correctly (Alibabaei et al., 2009).

TQM and BPR both aim to boost corporate performance by improving the business process. Nevertheless, TQM is considered an evolutionary approach that delivers incremental improvement, and it requires the corporation to enhance its process little by little continuously. Conversely, BPR intends to provide a radical improvement in a short period by changing the process design, and it is more like a revolutionary approach (Serban, 2015; Stoddard &Jarvenpaa, 1995). During the time of TQM and BPR, IT is viewed as a critical enabler to success because automating processes can provide many benefits if the processes are well designed (Fiedler, Grover, &Teng, 1995; Jurisch et al., 2013)

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In the early 21^st century, researchers and practitioners started to put TQM, BPR, and IT together under the name of BPM (Hammer, 2010; Kirkor, 2010; S.

M.Lee &Asllani, 1997; Roeser &Kern, 2015). BPM, therefore, includes two sets of tools that have a common goal but vary in essence. Which tool to use depends on the patterns of the performance deficiency. “Pervasive performance shortcomings generally indicate a design flaw; occasional ones are usually the result of execution difficulties” (Hammer, 2010).

2.2.3. Status of BPM

BPM gained more and more attention both in the academic field and in practice (Skrinjar &Trkman, 2013). The number of published research studies increased every year, and most were published in the Business Process Management Journal, followed by Conference Proceedings (Roeser &Kern, 2015). The most famous and premier conference for BPM researchers is The BPM Conference. According to Dumas (2015), recent BPM research trends focus on interdisciplinary aspects of BPM and validation of the BPM Lifecycle from industry track. Moreover, previous BPM research was mostly conducted in Europe, America, and countries in Asia like China, Japan, Korea and India. Therefore, there is a call for further research in other countries to contribute to the common knowledge of BPM (Roeser &Kern, 2015).