AI & automation
What Is Business Process Reengineering? BPR vs. Automation
Business process reengineering means redesigning a process around the result it must deliver instead of tuning or automating the current steps. Redesign first when the workflow itself is the problem; otherwise improve or automate what works.
The short answer
Business process reengineering (BPR) is a structured way to rethink and redesign how a piece of work gets done, starting from the result the customer needs instead of the current steps. The U.S. Government Accountability Office defines it as an approach that critically examines, rethinks and redesigns mission-delivery processes to achieve dramatic improvements in performance. It differs from incremental process improvement, which tunes a sound process, and from automation, which has software perform existing steps. For a small business, reengineering should come before automation when a workflow has many handoffs, long waits and no single owner.
- Reengineering redesigns the work, while automation has software perform the existing steps.
- Redesign first when handoffs, waiting and unclear ownership cause most of the delay.
- Improve or automate directly when the process is already basically sound.
What is business process reengineering?
Business process reengineering, usually shortened to BPR, is the practice of redesigning a business process as a whole instead of adjusting its individual steps. A process here means a set of activities that produces a product or service for a customer, such as turning an order into a delivered shipment or a service call into a paid invoice.
The term spread after Michael Hammer's 1990 Harvard Business Review article, "Reengineering Work: Don't Automate, Obliterate." In 1997 the U.S. General Accounting Office, now the Government Accountability Office (GAO), published a Business Process Reengineering Assessment Guide for federal projects. It defines BPR as a systematic, disciplined improvement approach that critically examines, rethinks and redesigns mission-delivery processes to achieve dramatic improvements in performance in areas important to customers and stakeholders. The guide was written for agencies, but its questions about purpose, handoffs and ownership apply at small-business scale.
Business process reengineering vs. process improvement vs. automation
The three approaches answer different questions, and a business can use more than one. GAO's guide groups continuous process improvement, business process redesign and reengineering as process management approaches that can be used together or separately, and it defines continuous process improvement as an ongoing effort to improve how work is done in increments. Automation is narrower: software performs steps that people performed before, whether or not those steps should exist. The table compares their starting question, what changes, scope, disruption, best fit and main risk.
| Question | Business process reengineering | Incremental process improvement | Automation |
|---|---|---|---|
| Starting question | What result does the customer need, and what is the simplest way to deliver it? | Which part of the current process causes delay or errors? | Which existing steps can software perform? |
| What changes | The sequence of work, roles, handoffs and sometimes the systems | Individual steps, forms, checklists and handoffs | Who or what performs a step; the step itself usually stays |
| Typical scope | A whole process that crosses departments | One step or one bottleneck | One task or handoff |
| Disruption | High: new roles, habits and training | Low to moderate | Low to moderate, plus monitoring and upkeep |
| Good fit when | The process is basically unsound or the gap to your goal is large | The process is basically sound | The steps are necessary, stable and clearly defined |
| Main risk | Stalls without leadership and staff support | Gains stay small if the design is the problem | A poor process runs faster and becomes harder to change |
Why automating a broken process locks it in
Automation follows the steps you give it. Suppose a purchase request passes through three approvals because of a rule written for a problem that no longer exists. An automated version routes it through three approvals faster and adds a system that someone has to maintain. The redundant step is now encoded in software, so removing it later takes a change request where a conversation used to be enough.
GAO's guide describes technology as an enabler of reengineering and warns that buying technology in the belief that its presence will lead to process innovation is a root cause of bad information system investments. Federal agencies are required by the Clinger-Cohen Act to assess and, where appropriate, redesign their processes before making significant IT investments. A private business is not bound by that law, but the order of operations holds for any organization that is about to pay for software.
Signs a workflow needs redesign before automation
GAO's screening questions for reengineering candidates translate well to a small business. A process may be a candidate when it is strategically important, needs dramatic improvement to meet your goals, frustrates customers, or has a long cycle time with many sequential steps, handoffs, checkpoints and waiting between them. Processes that depend heavily on information are also candidates, because software can collapse steps once the design allows it.
In a business with 10 to 50 people, the warning signs are usually visible on a process map before anyone measures them.
- Nobody owns the whole process; each department owns its piece and the delay sits between them.
- The same information is typed into two or more systems by different people.
- Steps exist to check the work of earlier steps, and a new check is added after each mistake.
- Staff keep a side spreadsheet or notebook because the official system does not reflect what is happening.
- Customers call for status because nobody can see where their request is.
- The process was designed around software, staff or a customer you no longer have.
When incremental improvement or automation is enough
GAO's guide recommends functional or incremental improvements when a process is basically sound or when an organization is not ready for major change. A workflow belongs in that group when the steps make sense, the owner is clear and the trouble is one slow manual task in the middle.
In those cases, fix the bottleneck. Replace a free-text email with a form, add a checklist for the step that keeps getting missed or automate the handoff that requires retyping. The EPA's description of lean kaizen events shows this style of work: a team that includes the people doing the job studies the current state, finds waste and puts improvements in place quickly, typically favoring solutions that avoid large capital outlays. Measure whether each change held before moving to the next bottleneck.
How business process reengineering works at small-business scale
Large reengineering programs involve steering committees and months of analysis. A small business can follow the same logic in a few working sessions if the owner takes part. GAO's guide sets the order: an organization should rethink what it should be doing before deciding how best to do it, and modeling the current process should move quickly so the team does not get bogged down in elaborate analysis. The guide also recommends testing alternatives with cost-effective methods such as prototyping and limited pilot tests.
- Name the outcome and the customer: what the process must deliver, to whom, by when and at what quality.
- Map the current process quickly, with the people who do the work, to find handoffs, waits, rework and checks.
- Question each step: what would happen if it disappeared, merged with another step or moved to the person who already has the information?
- Design two or three alternative processes from the outcome backward, each with one person who owns the whole flow.
- Compare the alternatives on cost, risk, disruption and time, and write a short business case for the one you choose.
- Pilot the new design on a slice of real work before changing systems or roles across the business.
- Automate the steps that stay stable in the new design and measure the result against your baseline.
Who needs to be involved in a redesign
GAO calls strong executive leadership the most critical readiness factor for reengineering, because a redesign changes roles, habits and sometimes reporting lines. In a small business, that means the owner or general manager has to sponsor the change and make the calls that cut across departments. The guide also defines a process owner as the person accountable for how a process works and improves, and it asks whether process maps have been validated by the people who do the work.
Outside help can supply a method and process analysis skills. GAO advises that the organization keep enough skill to retain leadership and control and carry out most of the work itself. The same holds if you hire a consultant: your team should own the new design, the operating notes and the reasons behind each decision.
Advantages and disadvantages of business process reengineering
When the design is the problem, reengineering can remove whole steps, handoffs and waits that incremental fixes cannot reach. GAO describes its aim as dramatic improvement in measures such as cost, quality, service and speed. A redesigned process also gives automation a cleaner target, with fewer steps, clearer rules and one owner.
Redesign takes time from the busiest people, changes how staff spend their day and can stall when leadership attention drifts. GAO notes that reengineering involves political, organizational, process and people issues and that an organization can rush into it without understanding what it is getting into.
- Advantage: removes steps instead of speeding them up.
- Advantage: gives one person accountability for the whole flow.
- Disadvantage: disruption and retraining while the new process settles.
- Disadvantage: depends on sustained attention from the owner or manager.
Then automate the redesigned process
Once the new design has run on real work and the steps are stable, automation has a clearer job. Pick the handoff with the most volume and a written rule, define the inputs and the destination, and decide who reviews exceptions. Reading variable text is a candidate for AI with a person checking the result, and fixed rules can run as ordinary logic.
Keep the redesign and the automation as separate decisions with separate measurements. If you change the process and the software in the same week, a drop in errors or a rise in complaints cannot be traced to either one.
Questions before you start
What is an example of business process reengineering?
Consider a hypothetical 20-person service company that handles warranty claims through four people. A receptionist logs the call, a coordinator requests photos, a technician reviews them and the office manager approves the credit. Each handoff waits in an inbox, and customers call to ask for status. A reengineered design might collect photos on the intake form and give one trained coordinator authority to approve claims under a set amount, sending only larger or unusual claims to the technician. That design drops the separate photo request and, for smaller claims, the technician review and manager approval, along with the inbox waits between them. Only then would the remaining intake and notification steps be automated.
Is business process reengineering the same as business process management?
The two are related but not the same. Business process management usually refers to the ongoing work of defining, measuring and improving an organization's processes, and the term is also used for software that runs workflows. Reengineering is one approach within that work, used when a process needs redesign instead of tuning.
Should we redesign our process or automate it first?
If a map of the workflow shows a sound process with one slow manual step, improve or automate that step. If it shows many handoffs, long waits, duplicate entry and no single owner, redesign first and automate the stable result. Bring a recent example of the work and the names of the people who handle it; walking that example through the process usually makes the answer clear. GLCO can help you decide and will say so if a simpler fix is enough.
Sources and further reading
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