---
id: "claim-failure-rate-reengineering"
type: "claim"
source_timestamps: ["¶2"]
tags: ["statistics", "historical-context"]
related: ["entity-michael-hammer", "entity-reengineering-the-corporation"]
confidence: "high"
testable: true
speakers: ["Michael Hammer"]
sources: ["governance"]
sourceVaultSlug: "hbr-seg-governance"
originDay: 7
articleStem: "hbr-cl-85-false-alignment-trap"
sourceUrl: "https://hbr.org/2026/07/the-false-alignment-trap"
sourceTitle: "The False Alignment Trap"
---
# 50-70% of Reengineering Efforts Fail

In 1993, [[entity-michael-hammer|Michael Hammer]] — founder of the business-process-reengineering movement — concluded that **50% to 70%** of organizations undertaking reengineering efforts fail to achieve their intended dramatic results. The claim appears in his and James Champy's 1993 book, [[entity-reengineering-the-corporation|Reengineering the Corporation]].

**Enrichment / nuance:** This range is broadly supported but *context-dependent*. It is Hammer's own practitioner estimate, **not** a formal meta-analysis or a single transparent empirical dataset — it functions as a widely quoted benchmark of high failure rates. Later change-management literature echoes similar ranges (60–70%; cf. Kotter's 70% claim in *Leading Change*), but critics (e.g., Hughes) note definitional fuzziness about what counts as 'failure' and weak methodology. Treat it as a *directionally valid, rough* estimate rather than a rigorously measured statistic. See also the modern BCG figure, [[claim-failure-rate-bcg]].