Consolidating findings from business process change case studies using system dynamics: The example of employee morale

Zuzana Kristekova ,Marlen Jurisch ,Michael Schermann ,Helmut Krcmar

doi:10.34105/j.kmel.2012.04.034

Abstract

In this paper, we explore system dynamics as a useful approach to consolidate findings from case studies on business process change (BPC) projects. We compile data from 65 BPC case studies to develop a system dynamics simulation model that helps us to investigate ‘employee morale’ as an important construct in BPC projects. We show that such simulation models consolidate the complex and often non-linear findings from BPC case studies in a way that makes it available to discourse among researchers, lecturers and students as well as BPC professionals. Thus, this paper contributes to knowledge management and learning by suggesting system dynamics as a valuable approach to illustrate and convey the complex relationships between important constructs in BPC. This paper also contributes to the domain of business process management by demonstrating the benefits of system dynamics as a way to review and consolidate the abundance of BPC case studies.

Highlights

Business process change (BPC) is a pivotal instrument for executives to improve business performance (Hammer & Champy, 1993; Hill & McCoy, 2011; Lopez, 2011)
In order to demonstrate the use of system dynamics (SD) for simulating certain developments in BPC projects, we develop a SD simulation model for managing and understanding employee morale when changing a business process
In addition to laying the groundwork for an empirically supported system dynamics approach in BPC, this paper extends the theory of BPC by identifying factors impacting employee morale in BPC projects as well as identifying relationships among these factors

Summary

Introduction

Business process change (BPC) is a pivotal instrument for executives to improve business performance (Hammer & Champy, 1993; Hill & McCoy, 2011; Lopez, 2011). BPC projects present risky interventions, which are often fraught with uncertainties, frequent delays, and even failures (Hill & McCoy, 2011). We argue that a plethora of research foci and diverse units of analysis limit the growth of the body of knowledge on BPC. Lecturers and professionals struggle with existing BPC training approaches that are frequently based on intuition rather than empirical data (Caulfield & Maj, 2002; Gardiner & Ford, 1980). Traditional education approaches are often not tailored to capture the many complexities of BPC projects. Experience with BPC projects presents the only scarce resource to convey knowledge about BPC (Jurisch, Cuno, Palka, Wolf, & Krcmar, 2012)

Objectives

Findings

Discussion

Conclusion