How to reengineer business processes like procurement?
Following the work of Hammer, Davenport and their colleagues, existing as-is procurement processes should be either obliterated rather than automated [13], or else understood and measured [5]. Accordingly, innovative to-be procurement processes should be prototyped using leading-edge IT as a new foundation for coordinating research grants management activities [5]. However, the ability to successfully realize the benefits of radical IT-based changes in most business processes has been elusive. Reflective studies of the problems, pitfalls and best practices of BPR find that certain organizational variables, rather than IT, are key to achieving successful BPR outcomes [1, 12]. In many of the BPR projects examined, BPR failure was reported to be the outcome about 70% of the time [1]. How can BPR failure be avoided when redesigning procurement processes? Available research results indicate that critical conditions to help realize successful BPR should include the participation and commitme
