Page 133 - Operations Strategy

108 CHAPTER 3 • SubSTiTuTES foR STRATEgy
BPR was at its peak often revealed that the majority of BPR projects could reduce staff
levels by over 20 per cent. Often, BPR was viewed as merely an excuse for getting rid of
staff. Companies that wished to ‘downsize’ were using BPR as the pretext, putting the
short-term interests of the shareholders of the company above either their longer-term
interests or the interests of the company’s employees.
The real danger is that a combination of radical redesign together with downsiz-
ing could mean that the essential core of experience is lost from the operation. This
leaves it vulnerable to any market turbulence since it no longer possesses the knowledge
and experience of how to cope with unexpected changes. This is a similar criticism
to what we describe in Chapter 8 as overly ‘tight fit’ between resources and market
requirements. When the operation’s resources are designed to focus exclusively on one
narrowly defined set of market requirements, it is vulnerable to any changes either in
market requirements or its own resource capabilities. In this sense the outcome of a BPR
project, even when implemented effectively, could be seen as carrying the same com-
bination of advantages and disadvantages as the focus strategy described in Chapter 2:
namely, exceptional performance under a defined set of circumstances but excess risk
when these circumstances no longer apply.

lessons from bPR

Although one of the later of the new approaches to operations, BPR is already suffering
from a backlash. Perhaps this is not surprising given its radical nature. The greater the
deviation from orthodoxy, the greater the level of criticism. Nevertheless, even with a
relatively short experience of using BPR principles, certain lessons emerge.
● Don’t dismiss radical approaches to reconfiguring operations resources. A radical
reconfiguration may carry a higher risk but it is a legitimate alternative to incremen-
tal development. Although, like many of these new approaches, there are examples
where expectations have not been met, there are also examples where radical rede-
sign has brought significant benefits. General Motors, South West Airlines, Hewlett-
Packard and many other high-profile companies all claim to have experienced some
significant success with BPR.
● New process technology, especially information technology, needs to be fully incor-
porated into process redesign. These new technologies often have much more poten-
tial than simply speeding up, or doing better, what was done before. They both have
capabilities (often associated with flexibility) that could be exploited in new ways
and they may need new infrastructural support to develop their potential.
● Beware of the publicity that comes when a new approach is branded in a particular
way. Very soon after its introduction, BPR had polarised expectations. Labour repre-
sentatives assumed that it would always be used as a heartless exercise for ‘employ-
ment bloodshed’. Business leaders, looking forward to often over-inflated estimates
of the saving that could be achieved, became disenchanted when these expectations
were not met immediately.
● Many of the ideas generated by BPR and the debate it provoked were already com-
monplace in manufacturing processes. BPR succeeded in moving the arena of this
debate from manufacturing to direct service processes and even to non-operations
processes. In that sense BPR helped to establish the idea that processes are ubiquitous
in business, and the same ideas and principles that shape process design within the
operations function can also be used outside it.

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