Process Redesign

Abstract

The thorough analysis of a business process typically sparks various ideas and directions for redesign. The problem is, however, that redesign is often not approached in a systematic way, but rather considered as a purely creative activity. The critical point with creative techniques is that parts of the spectrum of potential redesign options could be missed. As an alternative, suitable methods can be utilized to yield more and, hopefully, better redesign options. This chapter deals with rethinking and re-organizing business processes with the specific purpose of making them perform better. We clarify the motivation and the trade-offs of redesign. Then, we present two methods for systematically redesigning processes. First, we introduce Heuristic Process Redesign as a method that builds upon an extensive set of redesign options. The method is illustrated by the help of a case of a health care institute. Second, we present Product-based Design. This method derives a process design based on the composition of a product.