Technology or Process First? A Call for Mediation Between ESM and BPM Approaches in Organizations.

Enterprise Systems Management (ESM) and Business Process Management (BPM), although highly correlated, have evolved as alternative and mutually exclusive approaches to corporate infrastructure. As a result, companies struggle to nd the right balance between technology and process factors in infrastructure implementation projects. The purpose of this paper is articulate a need and a direction to mediate between the process-driven and the technology-driven approaches. Using a cross-case analysis, we gain insight into two examples of systems and process implementation. We highlight the dierences between them using strategic alignment, Enterprise Systems and Business Process Management theories. We argue that the insights from these cases can lead to a better alignment between process and technology. Implications for practice include the direction towards a closer integration of process and technology factors in organizations. Theoretical implications call for a design-oriented view of technology and process alignment.