If done properly, business process management will provide several key benefits to an organization, which can be used to contribute to competitive advantage. These benefits include:
• Empowering employees. When a business process is designed correctly and supported with information technology,
employees will be able to implement it on their own authority. In our returns-policy example, an employee would be
able to accept returns made before fourteen days or use the system to make determinations on what returns would be
allowed after fourteen days.
• Built-in reporting. By building measurement into the programming, the organization can keep up to date on key metrics
regarding their processes. In our example, these can be used to improve the returns process and also, ideally, to reduce
returns.
• Enforcing best practices. As an organization implements processes supported by information systems, it can work to
implement the best practices for that class of business process. In our example, the organization may want to require that
all customers returning a product without a receipt show a legal ID. This requirement can be built into the system so that
the return will not be processed unless a valid ID number is entered.
• Enforcing consistency. By creating a process and enforcing it with information technology, it is possible to create a
consistency across the entire organization. In our example, all stores in the retail chain can enforce the same returns
policy. And if the returns policy changes, the change can be instantly enforced across the entire chain.