Reengineering works: Don't report,exhort

Abstract

This article reviews over two decades the evolution of reengineering, a supposedly revolutionary approach to organizational change. In the sense that reengineering may be regarded as another organizational change initiative it is susceptible to many of the challenges raised about the historiography of organizational change. Re-engineering is located within a broader context of management and organizational history. In order to understand the evolution of reengineering it was necessary to review the two key publications — from the early 1990s, which encouraged the so-called reengineering revolution. The reporting of reengineering in the early 1990s in Lloyds Bank and National Westminster Bank offers an opportunity to consider the organizational language in use of reengineering.The conclusions that may be drawn from this article are that reengineering is stronger as a mandate for radical change than a methodology of radical change and that reengineering tends to be exhorted rather than reported.