Process mining in procurement: How organisational inertia impacts process development and automation efforts
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Journal Title
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School of Business |
Master's thesis
Authors
Date
2023
Department
Major/Subject
Mcode
Degree programme
Information and Service Management (ISM)
Language
en
Pages
123 + 10
Series
Abstract
Process mining has seen rapid adoption commercially during the last decade, especially among large organisations in the context of administrative processes like purchase-to-pay (P2P). The key value proposition of process mining has historically been based on the ability to automate process discovery, as process mining tools can provide insights into the current state of processes based on objective IT system data. However, a more recent trend in the process mining space has been a shift towards action-oriented process mining, as companies must act to address process inefficiencies that are found in the discovery stage to realise the value of process mining investments. This requires changing the process in some way, which can be hindered by organisational inertia: a common phenomenon which refers to the inability to enact change. This thesis explores the impact of organisational inertia on P2P process development and automation efforts in two large industrial Finnish case companies. Seven semi-structured interviews were carried out to explore the topic: four from Company A and three from Company B. The manifestations of inertia have been analysed based on four distinct sub-categories: resource rigidity, structural inertia, social inertia and technical inertia. The results point to the interconnected nature of these four elements as a change in one often requires subsequent changes in the other elements. The key similarities between the case companies point to the challenges presented by technical inertia, as overly complex or outdated system architectures hinder the use of process mining tools and the ability to implement changes in the P2P process. Interestingly, while most of the benefits relating to the use of process mining were related to the ability to improve process understanding, such as generating process improvement ideas, the key resource limitation within both companies was the time to pursue different development projects.Description
Thesis advisor
Penttinen, EskoKeywords
process mining, procurement, organisational inertia, process development, process automation, change management, purchase-to-pay, source-to-pay