Business Process Reengineering

Case Study: Joe’s Supermarket

This local supermarket is located in an urban neighborhood and provides customers with a wide

array of products to choose from. Over time, the inventory has grown exponentially, but the

current information system is not equipped to handle the increase in purchase demand. The

company that owns the store opted to go with the “light” versions of the Purchasing and Point of

Sale (POS) modules used to manage inventory and request products from vendors. The owner of

the organization (Joe Russo) has emphasized that there are critical things on his “wish list” that

he believes will move the supermarket into “the new tech age,” but he is not sure where to start.

Here is some information he wants the IT consultant to know, but there is more likely additional

information he is unaware of:

• Other processes that are part of the enterprise resource planning system are becoming

slower, and some of the staff noticed errors in some of the product data coming into the

system.

• A centralized database supports the entire system but has not been reviewed or upgraded.

• The time spent on customer transactions is too long! Anyone in management should be

able to monitor transactions in real-time, but the point of sale system sends the data “over

the wire” to the database slower each day. Some days there is a 2-hour lag in the system

catching up on transactions!

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Assignment:

You will explore the benefits and purpose of engaging in Business Process Reengineering

(BPR), implications of constraints on the planning process, and related themes. Be sure to

include the following in your paper:

• Explain the benefits and purpose of business process reengineering for organizations in

general.

• Use the ethos and ideals of Hammer and Champy to identify one or more systems in

the case study organization selected (Joe’s Supermarket) that could benefit from

business process reengineering, applying specific business process reengineering

themes presented in the reading.

• Discuss the enabling role of technology, and the resulting impact on customers,

competition, and change for the case study organization.

• Apply the constructs of Goldratt's Theory of Constraints (TOC) thinking processes to

the business processing reengineering planning for the case study organization ( Joe’s

Supermarket), describing its implications on related decisions.

• Explain the relationship between BPR project implementation and the following BPR

success factors:

o alignment with business strategy

o effective communication

o effective information technology infrastructure

o employee involvement

o integration of the information system

o proper cultural management

o continuous improvement

Length: 5 to 7-page paper, not including title and reference pages. APA.

References: Include a minimum of 3 scholarly references.

Readings:

• Hammer, M., & Champy, J. (2001). Reengineering the corporation: A manifesto for business revolution. Harper Collins Publishers.

• Ikeziri, L. M., Souza, F. B. de, Gupta, M. C., & de Camargo Fiorini, P. (2019). Theory of constraints: Review and bibliometric analysis. International Journal of Production

Research, 57(15/16), 5068–5102. https://doi.org/10.1080/00207543.2018.1518602