Best practice in reengineering: a successful example of the Porsche research and development center

Successful reengineering requires a systematic procedure for the useful implementation of methods and tools as well as a consideration of critical success factors. As an example of the reengineering of prototype part procurement in Porsche AG’s development centre, a specially developed 3x3 reengineering procedure is represented which not only implements methods and tools but also the reengineering project structure and experiences gained from it. The main aim of re‐engineering was to reduce the running time of the part procurement from 30 days to just one. This means a simultaneous reduction of the prototype construction time to about 20 hours. From results it can be established that after 20 weeks the success of the reengineering stabilised and the targeted running time of one day became apparent. The accompanying project evaluation crystallised various success factors. In particular the establishment of a competent and motivated team leader, as well as on‐line process controlling supported by IT implementation, have proved to be a successfully decisive measure and tool respectively.