From Reengineering to Process Management - A Longitudinal Study of BPR in a Danish Manufacturing Company

This paper is a longitudinal study of BPR initiatives at Enzyme Business carried out between January 1994 and March 1998 in Novo Nordisk A/S, one of the largest companies in Denmark and the world's largest producer of industrial enzymes with a market share of more than 50%. The paper provides empirical insight from a number of BPR-projects and related BPR-initiatives, e.g. Business System Reengineering projects. The paper suggests that reengineering focusing on process orientation and customer satisfaction in a functional organisation is a valid alternative to a fully implemented process organisation. Novo Nordisk Enzyme Business employs this approach by integrating functional, industrial, and business process strategies. As no process owner exists in this setting, a role as a so-called Flowmaker is established in order to facilitate and further streamline the activities of each reengineered process. Furthermore, it is concluded that several iterations in the Business System Diamond is required in order to mature the organisation in applying and obtaining success by the concept of Business Process Reengineering.