Workflow optimization through task redesign in business information processes

The academic and professional literature addressing business process reengineering points at inter-task information flow delays (handoffs) as a major source of processing errors and excessive delays in job completion times. Many of the success stories cited in the literature call for employee-empowerment and task consolidation. It means that many benefits are accrued by consolidating tasks, rather than processing the existing task structure at a faster rate. However, there has not been any systematic methodology available to determine the optimal re-bundling of information intensive tasks. Our paper presents a new powerful methodology designed to optimally consolidate tasks in order to reduce the overall cycle time. This methodology takes into account the following parameters: precedence of information flows, loss of specialization, alignment of decision rights, reduction in handoffs and technology support costs. Several application examples presented here highlight the viability of our approach and illustrate the key organizational and technological tradeoffs associated with the redesign of transaction processing activities.