Do Process Modelling Techniques Get Better? A Comparative Ontological Analysis of BPMN

Current initiatives in the field of Business Process Management (BPM) strive for the development of a BPM standard notation by pushing the Business Process Modeling Notation (BPMN). However, such a proposed standard notation needs to be carefully examined. Ontological analysis is an established theoretical approach to evaluating modelling techniques. This paper reports on the outcomes of an ontological analysis of BPMN and explores identified issues by reporting on interviews conducted with BPMN users in Australia. Complementing this analysis we consolidate our findings with previous ontological analyses of process modelling notations to deliver a comprehensive assessment of BPMN

On Engineering Support for Business Process Modelling and Redesign

Currently, there is an enormous (research) interest in business process redesign (BPR). Several management-oriented approaches have been proposed showing how to make BPR work. However, detailed descriptions of empirical experience are few. Consistent engineering methodologies to aid and guide a BPR-practitioner are currently emerging. Often, these methodologies are claimed to be developed for business process modelling, but stem directly from information system design cultures. We consider an engineering methodology for BPR to consist of modelling concepts, their representation, computerized tools and methods, and pragmatic skills and guidelines for off-line modelling, communicating, analyzing, (re)designing\ud business processes. The modelling concepts form the architectural basis of such an engineering methodology. Therefore, the choice, understanding and precise definition of these concepts determine the productivity and effectiveness of modelling tasks within a BPR project. The\ud current paper contributes to engineering support for BPR. We work out general issues that play a role in the development of engineering support for BPR. Furthermore, we introduce an architectural framework for business process modelling and redesign. This framework consists of a coherent set of modelling concepts and techniques on how to use them. The framework enables the modelling of both the structural and dynamic characteristics of business processes. We illustrate its applicability by modelling a case from service industry. Moreover, the architectural framework supports abstraction and refinement techniques. The use of these techniques for a BPR trajectory are discussed

Using Ontological Ideas to Facilitate the Comparison of Requirements Elicitation Methods

There are a plethora of system development methods available to practitioners, all purporting to be the best method. This variety brings with it an element of choice which can be perceived as a problem in itself, quite apart from the issue of developing a system. This paper uses elements of the ontological framework of Bunge, Wand and Weber to critically examine the constructs of several methods used to develop requirements specifications (and, in particular, business process models), notably the Business Rules Diagram (BRD) Method and the Unified Modelling Language (UML)

Domain design principles for managing complexity in conceptual modeling

Complexity is a problem that can be found in many aspects of research that deals with design. In particular, complexity is found in various business processes that must be modeled and represented in a meaningful way. One of the ways to address complexity is by using decomposition, for which a number of decomposition principles have been proposed. However, there are two domain specific areas in which these principles are lacking: the scope and the context of the problem. This research addresses this problem by deriving two new principles for managing complexity, and evaluates the proposed principles through an example case to illustrate their potential use

A Meta-Model Ontology based on Scenarios

This paper describes a proof-of-concept designed to test a meta-model ontology based on scenarios for representing the procedural knowledge of a given domain. The research was conducted as part of a study on methodologies to build ontologies for Information Systems. The frequent use of scenarios in the initial steps of the methodologies motivated us to investigate its use in the process of building ontologies for IS modeling. This research proposes the use of the components of scenarios as constructs of a meta-model ontology. With this approach, the process of building scenarios about a domain is mingled with the process of building domain ontologies

Theory-based Analyses of Interorganisational Standards for Self-organising, Adaptive Value Creation Networks

Today many enterprises find themselves in situations of forming new or integrating into existing value creation networks to strengthen their market position and to provide new innovative customer solutions to its customers. Due to their high complexity, effective and efficient value creation networks rely on self-organising and adaptive structures and processes. Information flows amongst business partners and the coordination of these flows by cooperation activities are major design parameters of such networks. Interorganisational standards (IOS) seek to ease information infrastructure design by providing a referential frame. However, practitioners finding themselves in situations of selecting specific standards and thereby deciding against others, so far lack sufficient theoretical guidance in this selection problem. This research informs the IOS selection problem by condensing insights from the body of knowledge from management cybernetics and coordination theory and identifying first requirements to a method guiding IOS choices

Integrating Multi-Perspective Views into Ontological Analysis

It is argued that contribution to the theory and practice of the analysis and design of information systems and services within organizational contexts requires the following steps. First, an underlying theoretical domain is needed. Second, the constructs of this domain have to be communicated using some commonly understood “language.” Third, these constructs have to be applied to purposes that are of interest to users, particularly business users. Finally, this application needs to take into consideration the constraints that users work under and, particularly in business, the need for cost effectiveness. It is claimed that the models developed by Bunge, Wand and Weber (BWW models), in particular the representation model, provide a good starting point for this theoretical foundation. In order to communicate the BWW models, an ER-based meta model for the BWW representation model is suggested. A common issue about some of the results with a number of the ontological analyses that have been done so far is the lack of relevance and cost effectiveness. This situation suggests that integrating perspectives into the process of ontological analysis would improve the usefulness of the results to users. Specifically, ensuring the relevance of the results to the different purposes of different users would improve the usefulness of the ontological analysis to users of modeling grammars. Accordingly, the application of a third dimension—the cost effectiveness dimension—to the analysis of modeling grammars using the BWW representation model is investigated. Specifically, the requirements of activity-based costing systems are analyzed as a first example of a perspective