SPRINT – BPR for Public Sector
I actually came across SPRINT while looking for Agile sprint in public sector – as sprint is also a development iteration in the Agile methodology.
The SPRINT web site is very user friendly and provide a very good overview of the methodology.
The SPRINT methodology is based on Business Process Reengineering (BPR) with focus on public sector.
BPR in the 90s
BPR was originally used to create dramatic improvements in businesses by radical process change with focus on generating customer value.
BPR used to be the business management buzzword of the 90’s and many projects was called BPR projects even without using the methodology hence BPR was also often unfairly blamed for many failures. However used correctly – BPR is a very powerful methodology with great potential hence the prosperity and future potential of SPRINT.
I did a few BPR projects encompassing both process; manufacturing and IT related back in the 90s and they all provided the expected dramatic change and customer value.
From BPR to SPRINT
In the book by Michael Hammer and James Champy "Reengineering the Corporation: A Manifesto For Business Revolution" they state the seven principles of BPR:
- Organize around outcomes, not tasks
- Identify all the processes in an organization and prioritize them in order of redesign urgency
- Integrate information processing work into the real work that produces the information
- Treat geographically dispersed resources as though they were centralized
- Link parallel activities in the workflow instead of just integrating their results
- Put the decision point where the work is performed, and build control into the process
- Capture information once and at the source
SPRINT adds a public sector angle on BPR including:
- Public Sector specific culture and social aspects of the business case
- An increased stakeholder group compared to a normal business including unions and central government
- A schematic framework for process design like Role Activity Diagram (RAD)
SPRINT going forward
The success of SPRINT will depend on its ability to provide value and to avoid the pitfalls of the 90s where BPR was a lifting pole for unpopular projects to make savings and redundancies rather than providing customer value.
The need for SPRINT will be accelerating as the public sector surroundings change with an ever increasing speed.
Social problems; an aging population; climate change and new technology continue to challenge the way the public sector works and SPRINT may just be the answer.