Search results

This paper examines the effectiveness of various business process improvement and benchmarking methodologies described in the literature and reported by survey respondents. As a result of this “benchmarking study” a new and potentially improved business process improvement methodology is developed.

This research paper aims to develop and validate an enhanced business process improvement methodology (EBPIM) by integrating the DMAIC (define, measure, analyze, improve and control) and the comprehensive business process management (CBPM) methodologies.

A systematic literature review and analysis were conducted to prove the novelty of the research approach and identify the similarities, differences, strengths and weaknesses of the DMAIC and the CBPM methodologies. The EBPIM was proposed based on the analysis results. Then, a focus group approach was used to evaluate and validate the methodology.

The EBPIM consists of nine activities: preparation, selection, description, quantification, modeling, enactment, improvement opportunities selection, analysis and improvement and monitoring. The proposed methodology adopted the systematic and structured process of the DMAIC methodology by having one tollgate between every two activities to check the progress and authorize the team to go to the next activity. At the same time, it has the ability of the CBPM methodology to enhance the interaction between human activities and business process management systems (BPMS).

The EBPIM was evaluated and validated by a focus group of academic professors. However, the main limitation of the proposed methodology is that it is still theoretical and needs to be empirically tested. Therefore, future work will focus on testing the EBPIM in different industries and organization sizes.

From the theoretical perspective, the proposed methodology adds value to the knowledge in the scope of business processes improvement methodologies (BPIMs) by integrating the DMAIC and the CBPM methodologies. It takes advantage of and combines the strengths of the DMAIC and CBPM methodologies. From the practical perspective, the proposed methodology presents a valuable tool that can facilitate the organization’s mission to improve the areas that need improvement using a systematic improvement methodology that will effectively enhance organizational performance (OP).

The BPIMs literature analysis proved that most of the reviewed methodologies could not support all phases of the business process improvement (BPI) activities. It was concluded that integrating the DMAIC and the CBPM methodologies is a novel approach. The proposed methodology will enhance the efficiency of both methodologies, fill the gaps that may exist in both of them and lead to better results in terms of BPI.

The purpose of this paper is to analyse the importance and role of process knowledge in the business process (BP) improvement methodology with the help of a case study.

The approach takes the form of a literature review that highlights the challenges and issues in the existing BP improvement methodologies. An in‐depth case study that has embarked on a major BP improvement initiative that emphasizes individual and collective process knowledge in a real‐life complex organization is presented.

The paper confirms that BP improvement is, in fact, a complex, knowledge‐intensive, collaborative process that consists of a set of coordinated, contextualized knowledge management processes. The design of the “to‐be” process in this study is a knowledge co‐creation process that uses collaborative exploration of different scenarios and contexts. Compared with the traditional BP improvement methodologies where the main emphasis is on the design of a new process model, the focus of the methodology employed in this case study is on the process of knowledge co‐creation and transfer.

The paper leads to increased recognition of the knowledge and experience people develop, use and share while modeling, executing, and improving their BPs. It offers anecdotal evidence and general case study research limitations apply.

Practitioners should focus more on key knowledge processes rather than BP models that often obscure the role of individual and collective process knowledge. Rather than investing limited resources in the mapping and modeling of existing processes, practitioners will be able to better serve their organizations if they concentrate on the improvement of the process by tapping the contextualized process knowledge possessed by the individual actors.

In the expanding field of BP management, the study explores the increasing importance of individual and collective process knowledge in process improvement methodologies and provides guidance to user organizations on ways to exploit the value of process knowledge in designing new processes as well as collaborative knowledge sharing and creation process.

Data-driven quality management systems, brought about by the implementation of digitisation and digital technologies, is an integral part of improving supply chain management performance. The purpose of this study is to determine a methodology to aid the implementation of digital technologies and digitisation of the supply chain to enable data-driven quality management and the reduction of waste from manufacturing processes.

Methodologies from both the quality management and data science disciplines were implemented together to test their effectiveness in digitalising a manufacturing process to improve supply chain management performance. The hybrid digitisation approach to process improvement (HyDAPI) methodology was developed using findings from the industrial use case.

Upon assessment of the existing methodologies, Six Sigma and CRISP-DM were found to be the most suitable process improvement and data mining methodologies, respectively. The case study revealed gaps in the implementation of both the Six Sigma and CRISP-DM methodologies in relation to digitisation of the manufacturing process.

Valuable practical learnings borne out of the implementation of these methodologies were used to develop the HyDAPI methodology. This methodology offers a pragmatic step by step approach for industrial practitioners to digitally transform their traditional manufacturing processes to enable data-driven quality management and improved supply chain management performance.

This study proposes the HyDAPI methodology that utilises key elements of the Six Sigma DMAIC and the CRISP-DM methodologies along with additions proposed by the author, to aid with the digitisation of manufacturing processes leading to data-driven quality management of operations within the supply chain.

There appears to be an ever‐insatiable demand from markets for organisations to improve their products and services. To meet this, there is a need to provide business process improvement (BPI) methodologies that are holistic, structured and procedural. Therefore, this paper describes research that has formed and tested a generic and practical methodology termed model‐based and integrated process improvement (MIPI) to support the implementation of BPI; and to validate its effectiveness in organisations. This methodology has been created as an aid for practitioners within organisations.

The research objectives were achieved by: reviewing and analysing current methodologies, and selecting a few frameworks against key performance indicators. Using a refined Delphi approach and semi‐structured interview with the “experts” in the field. Intervention, case study and process research approach to evaluating a methodology.

The BPI methodology was successfully formed and applied by the researcher and directly by the companies involved against the criteria of feasibility, usability and usefulness.

The paper has demonstrated a new knowledge on how to systematically assess a BPI methodology in practice.

Model‐based and integrated process improvement methodology (MIPI) methodology offers the practitioner (experienced and novice) a set of step‐by‐step aids necessary to make informed, consistent and efficient changes to business processes.

The novelty of this research work is the creation of a holistic workbook‐based methodology with relevant tools and techniques. It extends the capabilities of existing methodologies.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a structured overview of so‐called business process improvement (BPI) approaches and their contribution to the actual act of improving. Even though a lot is said about BPI, there is still a lack of supporting the act of improving the process. Most approaches concentrate on what needs to be done before and after the improvement act, but the act of improving itself still seems to be a black box.

This paper is mainly based on a review of literature that deals with the term “Business Process Improvement”. The analysis of the literature is supported by qualitative content analysis. The structure of the evaluation follows the mandatory elements of a method (MEM).

A lot of literature and consulting approaches deal with the restructuring and improvement of business processes. The author finds that even so‐called BPI approaches do not describe the act of improvement itself. And if they do, they lack a methodological structure that can be reused.

To constrain the complexity of this research at this first stage of investigation only the search criterion “business process improvement” was used in the database search (EBSCO and Emerald).

The paper is valuable for academics and practitioners because the impact of BPI on organizational performance is high. Its originality is in the structured evaluation of so‐called BPI approaches according to the MEM, which so far no one has investigated.

Modeling of the methods for providing improvements in business processes by value adding is researched with an integrated approach. The main purpose in this approach is improving the processes by determining and analyzing the weak points and reducing the weakness degrees.

The designed model determines weak points that need to be improved, analyzes them to find privileged processes in improvement by considering improvement costs and obtains the improvement degrees for defining the improvement strategy by four‐phase business process improvement framework: start‐up, self analysis, defining improvement strategy for making changes, feedback, and continuous improvement.

The key factor in keeping up with changes in market conditions is systematic application of improvement efforts and providing planned and controlled value addition with these improvements. Decision problems in process improvement can be structured to provide input data suitable for multi‐criteria decision making techniques and results meet the solution expectations.

The reason for using analytical hierarchy process, goal programming, and linear programming model is to select the process and determine its improvement degree. Solving the decision problems by these techniques is a time consuming process, so forming suitable programs with decision support systems will be useful.

The theoretical structure of the modeled techniques in this study was examined with an industrial application. The application process and the results suitability were determined.

The proposed model shows improvement amounts according to the amount of defined importance degrees. It presents an advantage to decision makers by giving concrete improvement values from model results determining their improvement strategies.

The purpose of this paper is to develop and validate a new framework for continuous improvement.

The literature review on customer value and strategic quality provides the basis for the identification of a conceptual framework for continuous improvement. This conceptual framework is validated using the in-depth interview and the survey approach.

The empirical study concluded that the new framework contains all the core components or forces of continuous improvement. These forces are customer value focused co-leadership, customer value focused strategic objectives, improvement specialists with people performance knowledge and improvement methodology. By adopting this framework, all process personnel can have a role to play in process improvement leading to increased organisational returns on investment. Overall, it is an effective framework that is easily understood and can be applied throughout any process led organisation. This is supported by the empirical data.

This new framework can demonstrate to each organisational employee where they fit into the organisational continuous improvement strategy. This paper provides practitioners with a new validated continuous improvement framework that has application in all organisations that are involved in process customer value improvement. The researchers contend that this new framework can compliment existing continuous improvement frameworks.

This paper develops and validates a new framework for continuous improvement. By adopting this framework, all process personnel can have a role to play in process improvement leading to increased organisational returns on investment. This is supported by the empirical data. Also, the authors contend that this framework embraces the systems thinking approach (Conti, 2010) or systemic approach as people interact with customers, processes, improvement methodologies and each other to drive customer value improvement. Consequently, this generates a need to take global view of the combined effect of all customer value improvement components. This systems thinking can feed into future research.

This paper aims to describe the application of several Six Sigma tools to explain the improvement changes needed in a company that manufactures concrete blocks. The paper explains the methodology and the tools of the Six Sigma system, their use in the project, the application of the DMAIC (Define, Measure, Analyse, Improve and Control) process for the identification and definition of the problems, the related performance variables and the results obtained.

The paper reports the research made to improve the production of concrete blocks, specifically, the application of the DMAIC process, which is part of the Six Sigma methodologies; DMAIC stands for Definition of the problem, Measurement of the performance, Analysis using specific statistical methods and tools, Improvement the factors that cause the problem and Control the processes to ensure that the problem will not occur again. Each of those steps is explained in detail in the paper, which also presents the application of other improvement techniques.

The results show the adaptability and relevance of Six Sigma for the improvement of production operations. It is clearly demonstrated that it leads to benefits such as the elimination of machine downtime, reduction of scrap from 18 to 2 per cent and the improvements made in plant layout and production facilities to increase the productivity.

In improvement projects, the differential between the initial and final conditions varies, depending on the magnitude of the problems or potential opportunities. Although this paper describes only the application of Six Sigma, the methodology has a wide potential application in most manufacturing industries.

With the Six Sigma and DMAIC tools’ application and the improvement process, the agility obtained is driving a more mechanized perspective of production operations. The customer service level was increased, through fast deliveries of complete orders. This project shows that the application of the Six Sigma methodology is feasible and produces attractive financial and operational results in this segment of the construction industry.

The companies dedicated to the production of concrete blocks commonly reproduce the systems and standards of the industry, which are commonly designed around civil engineering and technical issues. Thus, the application of improvement tools is exceptional in manufacturing environments. Although this paper is just one application of the methodology, it explains in detail the DMAIC use for companies that are committed to the development of new competencies to increase their competitiveness.

Problem solving and continuous process improvement are key elements to achieve business excellence. Many problem solving and process improvement methodologies have been proposed and adopted by organisations, with DMAIC being the most widely used. The purpose of this paper is to present an empirical application of a modified version of DMAIC which enabled a world-class organisation to achieve an optimum reduction in the lead time of its aerospace engine assembly process.

The paper reviews the most commonly used problem solving and process improvement methodologies and specifically, DMAIC, its variations and limitations. Based on this, it presents define, measure, analyse, improve, review, control (DMAIRC). Finally, DMAIRC is empirically applied through a case study, in a world-class manufacturing organisation.

The results obtained from the case study indicate that DMAIRC is an effective alternative to achieve the maximum improvement potential of a process. In particular, DMAIRC helped the organisation studied to achieve a 30 percent reduction in the lead time of its engine assembly process.

The novel problem solving and process improvement methodology presented in this paper can be used by organisations to undertake a more effective improvement project by assuring that the maximum potential of their improvement initiatives and processes is achieved.