Research

Managing organizational processes is an ongoing endeavour. It does not start with a reengineering project, and does not end with the deployment of a workflow solution. Instead, it is a continuous cycle of design, implementation, execution and evaluation, much like the Deming cycle developed in the 1950s. Most process management research projects address a particular aspect of the process management life cycle, but few look at the overall effect of process automation on organizations. Research projects in BPM look at the relationship between process automation and organizational change. Since the automation of business processes will increase, mainly due to the immense efficiency gains it promises, organizations will have to learn to make the most of process automation technology.

Therefore, typical research questions are:

• What are the organizational effects of process automation?
• What are critical success factors for process automation projects?
• Which type of automation is suitable for which organization?