860 research outputs found

    Identifying and addressing adaptability and information system requirements for tactical management

    Get PDF

    Semantic business process management: a vision towards using semantic web services for business process management

    Get PDF
    Business process management (BPM) is the approach to manage the execution of IT-supported business operations from a business expert's view rather than from a technical perspective. However, the degree of mechanization in BPM is still very limited, creating inertia in the necessary evolution and dynamics of business processes, and BPM does not provide a truly unified view on the process space of an organization. We trace back the problem of mechanization of BPM to an ontological one, i.e. the lack of machine-accessible semantics, and argue that the modeling constructs of semantic Web services frameworks, especially WSMO, are a natural fit to creating such a representation. As a consequence, we propose to combine SWS and BPM and create one consolidated technology, which we call semantic business process management (SBPM

    Formalization and Model Checking of BPMN Collaboration Diagrams with DD-LOTOS

    Get PDF
    Business Process Model and Notation (BPMN) is a standard graphical notation for modeling complex business processes. Given the importance of business processes, the modeling analysis and validation stage for BPMN is essential. In recent years, BPMN notation has become a widespread practice in business process modeling because of these intuitive diagrams. BPMN diagrams are built from basic elements. The major challenge of BPMN diagrams is the lack of formal semantics, which leads to several interpretations of the concerned diagrams. Hence, this work aims to propose an approach for checking BPMN collaboration diagrams to guarantee some properties of smooth functioning of systems modeled by BPMN notation. The verification approach used in this work is based on model checking techniques. The approach proposes as a first step a formal semantics of the collaboration diagrams in terms of the formal language DD-LOTOS, i.e., a phase of the transformation of collaboration diagrams into DD-LOTOS. This transformation is guided by applying the inference rules of the formal semantics of the DD-LOTOS formal language, and we then use the UPPAAL model checker to check the absence of deadlock, safety properties, and liveness properties

    Investigating business process elements: a journey from the field of Business Process Management to ontological analysis, and back

    Get PDF
    Business process modelling languages (BPMLs) typically enable the representation of business processes via the creation of process models, which are constructed using the elements and graphical symbols of the BPML itself. Despite the wide literature on business process modelling languages, on the comparison between graphical components of different languages, on the development and enrichment of new and existing notations, and the numerous definitions of what a business process is, the BPM community still lacks a robust (ontological) characterisation of the elements involved in business process models and, even more importantly, of the very notion of business process. While some efforts have been done towards this direction, the majority of works in this area focuses on the analysis of the behavioural (control flow) aspects of process models only, thus neglecting other central modelling elements, such as those denoting process participants (e.g., data objects, actors), relationships among activities, goals, values, and so on. The overall purpose of this PhD thesis is to provide a systematic study of the elements that constitute a business process, based on ontological analysis, and to apply these results back to the Business Process Management field. The major contributions that were achieved in pursuing our overall purpose are: (i) a first comprehensive and systematic investigation of what constitutes a business process meta-model in literature, and a definition of what we call a literature-based business process meta-model starting from the different business process meta-models proposed in the literature; (ii) the ontological analysis of four business process elements (event, participant, relationship among activities, and goal), which were identified as missing or problematic in the literature and in the literature-based meta-model; (iii) the revision of the literature-based business process meta-model that incorporates the analysis of the four investigated business process elements - event, participant, relationship among activities and goal; and (iv) the definition and evaluation of a notation that enriches the relationships between activities by including the notions of occurrence dependences and rationales

    Involving users in the development of a modeling language for customer journeys

    Get PDF
    Although numerous methods for handling the technical aspects of developing domain-specific modeling languages (DSMLs) have been formalized, user needs and usability aspects are often addressed late in the development process and in an ad hoc manner. To this concern, this paper presents the development of the customer journey modeling language (CJML), a DSML for modeling service processes from the end-user’s perspective. Because CJML targets a wide and heterogeneous group of users, its usability can be challenging to plan and assess. This paper describes how an industry-relevant DSML was systematically improved by using a variety of user-centered design techniques in close collaboration with the target group, whose feedback was used to refine and evolve the syntax and semantics of CJML. We also suggest how a service-providing organization may benefit from adopting CJML as a unifying language for documentation purposes, compliance analysis, and service innovation. Finally, we distill what we learned into general lessons and methodological guidelines.publishedVersio

    Business Process Management Education in Academia: Status, challenges, and Recommendations

    Get PDF
    In response to the growing proliferation of Business Process Management (BPM) in industry and the demand this creates for BPM expertise, universities across the globe are at various stages of incorporating knowledge and skills in their teaching offerings. However, there are still only a handful of institutions that offer specialized education in BPM in a systematic and in-depth manner. This article is based on a global educators’ panel discussion held at the 2009 European Conference on Information Systems in Verona, Italy. The article presents the BPM programs of five universities from Australia, Europe, Africa, and North America, describing the BPM content covered, program and course structures, and challenges and lessons learned. The article also provides a comparative content analysis of BPM education programs illustrating a heterogeneous view of BPM. The examples presented demonstrate how different courses and programs can be developed to meet the educational goals of a university department, program, or school. This article contributes insights on how best to continuously sustain and reshape BPM education to ensure it remains dynamic, responsive, and sustainable in light of the evolving and ever-changing marketplace demands for BPM expertise

    CAiSE Radar 2016

    Get PDF
    The CAiSE Radar is an experimental format, established for CAiSE 2016, to make CAiSE workshops livelier, exciting, stimulate discussions, and attract additional active participants by establishing an environment where not only well established and validated research is reported but research in infancy, new ideas, and potentially interesting research projects can be presented and discussed. So similarly to a radar, the idea is to enable researchers to look into the future of the field and identify upcoming trends early. The aim of such effort is on one hand to contribute to the building of research communities and promote the integration of young researchers into the community, and on the other hand to provide opportunities to discuss ideas early and to receive additional opinions on planned research

    USER EVALUATION OF SYMBOLS FOR CORE BUSINESS PROCESS MODELING CONCEPTS

    Get PDF
    Process modeling notations are visual languages that use symbols to represent their main concepts. This study investigates the quality of such symbols from users’ perspective. The design of a symbol influences whether it is easy to spot in a model and is correctly associated with the concept it represents. In an empirical study with 188 participants, the normative ratings of process model symbols (for the basic concepts of start, end, task, AND, XOR) were gathered on the dimensions of perceptual pop-out, semantic transparency, perceptual discriminability, and aesthetics. Overall, the results are consistent with our predictions based on the theoretical analyses of the designs of the symbols. Prior familiarity with process modeling notations led to more clear-cut evaluations of routing symbols (AND, XOR) and a reduced tendency to prefer middle rating options, but it did not affect the evaluations of the other symbols. Standardization organizations and academic developers of notations can use insights from the study to enhance the usability of process modeling notations
    • …
    corecore