Purpose – The economic downturn requires prudent cost reductions, yet only 10 percent of companies sustain cost reductions after three years. Some of the most successful cost cutters have learned to engage their workforce to embrace both the rational and emotional arguments for taking action...

Purpose – Modeling of the methods for providing improvements in business processes by value adding is researched with an integrated approach. The main purpose in this approach is improving the processes by determining and analyzing the weak points and reducing the weakness degrees....

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate how a systems approach can be used to facilitate the development of an organizational performance measurement system. Design/methodology/approach – Based on a review of the literature, the paper introduces the implications for applying a...

Purpose – To examine the processes used by custodians of business excellence frameworks (BEFs) internationally to review and revise their frameworks, and to present the findings of a review of the design of the Australian business excellence framework (ABEF). Design/methodology/approach – A...

Purpose – There is a clear recognition that strategic management models are frameworks for achieving sustainable competitive advantage. In this sense, excellence models are directly related to intellectual capital models. The purpose of this paper is to trace and define the relation between...

Purpose – The purpose of this research is to show how the variety of ways of performing through knowledge and intangible resources exploitation raises the question of how these kind of resources can be coherently and successfully declined into companies' processes and operations, what are the...

Purpose – Building on previous studies of the managerial application and development of the 5S concept (5S), this research aims to identify and present key concepts of 5S from a Japanese management perspective. These findings link 5S to aspects of Japanese management approach, which are...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate if different applications of process orientation exist and how these are characterised. Furthermore, the objective is to investigate how the applications of process orientation relate to the line organization. Design/methodology/approach...