Analysing implementation of Business Process Management at a mining company from a Systems Leadership perspective

Abstract

Business Process Management, as an improvement initiative, has been an important concept in organisations for many years. However, implementation is challenging. If companies want to survive in today's challenging business environment, they will have to implement improvement initiatives successfully to gain a competitive advantage. Failures in Business Process Management implementation can be attributed to poor change management. Leadership did not recognise the need for change, maintained a too rigid structure, failed to anticipate employee resistance, or failed to do specific leadership tasks. The purpose of this research was to investigate both leadership and change management with regards to Business Process Management and to answer the following questions: Why is there a delay in implementation of Business Process Management at an identified mining department? What are the patterns in the data saying about the critical issues experienced by employees at the identified department? What is the leadership like at the identified department? A semi-structured interview process collected data from participants working at a department where Business Process Management has been implemented. The interviews collected data on critical issues experienced by employees. This was done to determine what critical enablers were missing and what issues needed to be addressed to ensure a smooth and sustainable implementation. The results indicate distinctly encouraging views of optimism and positivism about most concepts and dimensions, including Business Process Management. Participants expressed concerning views about leadership accountability, leadership skills, an implementation that was not done sufficiently, and feedback not reaching the employees doing the work. The results of this research are of high importance to the management of the identified mining company for the successful implementation of Business Process Management. This research study comes to an end with recommendations, limitations, and a conclusion.