The document summarizes a literature review on the relationship between business process management (BPM) and organizational culture. It identifies that culture is under-researched in the BPM field. The review analyzed papers on how culture influences BPM and vice versa. It developed a framework covering the impact of national, organizational, work group, and BPM cultures on one another. The review concluded that more research is needed on defining a BPM culture and managing cultural alignments between BPM approaches and contextual cultures.

1. Cultures in Business
Process Management
Prepared by;
Muhammad Daniyal Munir

2. Business process management
 Business process management (BPM) is a management
approach that developed with a strong focus on the adoption
of information technology (IT).
 BPM emerged as a succeeding concept to total quality management
(TQM) in the 1980s and business process reengineering (BPR) in the
1990s.
 Leidner and Keyworth (2006) differentiate the following relations
between the concepts culture and IT:
-The impact of culture on IT
-The impact of IT on culture
-IT culture.

3. Business process management
Business process management is comprised of several
core areas.
 Technical approach:
Focuses on two aspects;
-Support of business processes.
-Their Design.
 Holistic approach:
It includes;
-further organizational aspects of BPM.
-perceives processes as the central core through which business is
conducted.

4. Culture
Culture is a broad and blurry concept because it is
associated differently depending on the context.
Different Views:
 Hofstede (2005) considers culture to be the “collective
programming of the mind” while
 Schein (2004) suggests that a group learns “a pattern of shared
basic assumptions.”

5. Scope of Culture
The scope of culture by differentiating between two
defining elements:
1. The manifestation of culture:
Schein’s (2004) concept of culture differentiates three layers.
a. Artifacts
b. Espoused values
c. Basic underlying assumptions
2. The scope of the referenced group:
Regarding the scope of referenced group it includes:
a. National culture
b. Organizational culture

6. Design of the Literature Review
Three Step Process
1. Defining a research basis:
BPM journal Journal databases BPM conference Conference database
Source Emerald Emerald, EBSCO BSP,
ABI Inform
Google, books, hard
copies
AIS Electronic Library
Search term I Business Process
Management
Journal
“Business process
management” OR
BPM
Culture “Business process
management”
Search field I Publication title Document
title/abstract
Full text Title/abstract
Search term II [AND] “business
process
management” OR
BPM
[AND] culture [OR] cultural [OR] BPM
Search field II Document
title/abstract
Full text Full text Title/abstract

7. Three Step Process
2. Extracting and categorizing relevant research:
This step aims to provide a quantitative overview of relevant research on
culture topics in BPM.
They defined two categories of relevant papers.
1. Research that mentions culture’s role in BPM.
2. Research that elaborates on cultural aspects in BPM.

8. Three Step Process
3. Analyzing research on culture in BPM:
It provides the qualitative approach on the research. It is based on two
dimensions.
 The group referred to- included the group referred to when discussing
culture.
 The relationship between BPM and culture- discussed three relationships
between culture and BPM.
-Culture as an independent factor influencing BPM.
-Culture as a dependent factor influenced by BPM.
-Culture as BPM culture.

9. Results of the Research
-Quantitative results of the research have identified
papers including the cultures role in BPM. The results
show that the topic was under-researched already in the
BPM community.
-Overall, qualitative results of research analysis allows for a more detailed
statement on the current state of the research. It includes results on:
 BPM and work group culture
 BPM and organizational culture.
 BPM and national culture
-Detailed analysis of culture in BPM added a new dimension of culture in
addition to the previous three. It is referred to as culture as an important
aspect in BPM.

10. The Cultural Framework/ Cultural Model

11. Discussion
 Impact:
The BPM model represents the foundation for future research on BPM
culture and its relationship to interfering group cultures.
The managerial impact of the literature review lies in the orientation it
provides for practice. It helps foresee dimensions of possible conflicts that
are based on cultural aspects.

12. Discussion
 Limitations:
Concerning the framework, they are aware that it can be discussed to what
extent one should speak of a Business Process Management culture or a
business process culture since process orientation not only affects
management.
The findings of our structured literature review revealed only a small sample
of articles resulting in restricted generalizations.

13. Discussion
 Future research:
The results of the literature review call for further research
regarding several aspects of culture’s role in Business
Process Management.
Future research considers the following questions:
 What characterizes the concept of a Business Process Management
culture in detail?
 What measures are suitable to achieve a cultural fit between a Business
Process Management culture and its cultural context?
 What determines the relationship between Business Process Management
culture and national, organizational, and work group cultures?

14. Conclusion
The literature review gives two insights on research
considering culture in Business Process Management.
1. Quantitative Overview
2. Qualitative Analysis

15. Conclusion
Literature review involves major sources of:
 Business Process Management community.
 Business Process Management journal.
 Business Process Management conference.
 Several journal and conference databases.

16. Conclusion
Based on the review, our three research objectives
have been achieved:
a) We provided an overview of existing research on culture within the
domain of Business Process Management.
b) we developed a frame of reference regarding culture in Business
Process Management.
c) we derived potential areas for future research in the field.