Schmiedel, Theresa
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A theory of contingent business process management
Purpose - Many researchers and practitioners suggest a contingent instead of a “one size fits all” approach in business process management (BPM). The purpose of this paper is to offer a contingency theory of BPM, which proposes contingency factors relevant to the successful management of business processes and that explains how and why these contingencies impact the relationships between process management and performance. Design/methodology/approach - The authors develop the theory by drawing on organizational information processing theory (OIPT) and applying an information processing (IP) perspective to the process level. Findings - The premise of the model is that the process management mechanisms such as documentation, standardization or monitoring must compensate for the uncertainty and equivocality of the nature of the process that has to be managed. In turn, managing through successful adaptation is a prerequisite for process performance. Research limitations/implications - The theory provides a set of testable propositions that specify the relationship between process management mechanisms and process performance. The authors also discuss implications of the new theory for further theorizing and outline empirical research strategies that can be followed to enact, evaluate and extend the theory. Practical implications - The theory developed in this paper allows an alternative way to describe organizational processes and supports the derivation of context-sensitive management approaches for process documentation, standardization, monitoring, execution and coordination. Originality/value - The theoretical model is novel in that it provides a contextualized view on BPM that acknowledges different types of processes and suggests different mechanisms for managing these. The authors hope the paper serves as inspiration both for further theory development as well as to empirical studies that test, refute, support or otherwise augment the arguments.
Topic modeling as a strategy of inquiry in organizational research: a tutorial with an application example on organizational culture
Research has emphasized the limitations of qualitative and quantitative approaches to studying organizational phenomena. For example, in-depth interviews are resource-intensive, while questionnaires with closed-ended questions can only measure predefined constructs. With the recent availability of large textual data sets and increased computational power, text mining has become an attractive method that has the potential to mitigate some of these limitations. Thus, we suggest applying topic modeling, a specific text mining technique, as a new and complementary strategy of inquiry to study organizational phenomena. In particular, we outline the potentials of structural topic modeling for organizational research and provide a step-by-step tutorial on how to apply it. Our application example builds on 428,492 reviews of Fortune 500 companies from the online platform Glassdoor, on which employees can evaluate organizations. We demonstrate how structural topic models allow to inductively identify topics that matter to employees and quantify their relationship with employees’ perception of organizational culture. We discuss the advantages and limitations of topic modeling as a research method and outline how future research can apply the technique to study organizational phenomena.
Development and validation of an instrument to measure and manage organizational process variety
Organizational processes vary. Practitioners have developed simple frameworks to differentiate them. Surprisingly, the academic literature on process management does not – it typically strives for one method to manage all processes. We draw on organizational information-processing theory to systematically develop a new, theoretically motivated classification model for organizational processes. We validate this model using survey data from 141 process practitioners of a global corporation. We derive three distinct types of processes and demonstrate that an understanding of process variety based on process dimensions can differentiate processes better than existing frameworks used in practice. Our findings can enable process managers to make informed decisions and serve as a basis for contingent process management.
The relation between BPM culture, BPM methods, and process performance: evidence from quantitative field studies
Business process management (BPM) research conceptualizes BPM culture as a type of organizational culture that supports BPM. No quantitative fieldwork has so far examined how such a supporting role manifests itself. We study the relationship between BPM culture, BPM methods, and process performance empirically. Our analysis of multiple survey data sets from a total of 581 practitioners of multiple industries suggests that BPM methods indirectly contribute to process performance by establishing a BPM culture. This finding updates the prevalent assumption that the correct application of methods yields direct performance benefits. We discuss several implications for theory and practice.
Understanding the nature of processes: an information-processing perspective
Purpose – While researchers and practitioners agree on the importance to adapt business process management (BPM) practices to the nature of processes, the authors observe a lack of research on how to most meaningfully distinguish processes in order to apply context-specific BPM practices that increase process efficiency and effectiveness. The purpose of this paper is to systematically analyze the nature of processes as one contextual factor for BPM. Design/methodology/approach – Based on a literature review, the authors systematically derive process dimensions that describe the nature of processes and apply an information-processing perspective to the process level as a theoretical lens through which to analyze and structure these process dimensions. Findings – The authors identified 36 dimensions used to describe process differences that can be consolidated into five generic dimensions based on an information-processing perspective: interdependence of process participants, differentiation of process participants, differentiation of process participants, process analyzability, variability, and importance.