Business process analysis and modeling

Integrerade affärssystem och affärsprocesser

Contents

Business Process Management Business process models: what is a

model? Business process analysis: text analysis Business process modelling: different

modelling techniques are presented

Business Process Management

5 steps:– Business process identification– Business process analysis– Business process modelling– Business process change/implementation– Business process monitoring, control and

evaluation

Models

•A representation of reality:•There can be different models of the same reality

Reality

Model 1

Model 2

Model 3

Business process analysis and modeling

Business process model is – A description, representation, specification

of a business process Business process analysis and modelling

– key issues: – how to create a machine-processable model

of processes?– how to represent the different aspects of a

business process?

Business processes have several dimensions

Business processes can be described in several manners:– Organizational dimension: describes the

organizational aspects of the process. Who is involved? What are the reposonisbilities? Who makes decisions?

– Data dimension: describes the data and informations elements involved in the process.

– Function dimension: describes the functions (operations) that are needed in order to run the process

– …And in models that actually incorporate the three dimensions above into a single model.

Business process analysis and modeling

Business process modeling methods: – ways to represent business process models

Business process analysis methods and techniques: – analytical frameworks and techniques that

helps you to create model from source information

– also involves modeling techniques

Process modelling methods and techniques

Diagramming techniques:– One of the most common description of process

models– can be in many different forms because there

are many different diagramming techniques for different purposes

– Formal diagram techniques:• Data Flow Diagrams• Process Flowchart• ANSI Process Flowcharts • IDEF• etc

Process modelling methods and techniques Linguistic Approach

– Structured English (Pseudocode)– OPR STATEMENT

Object oriented approach– ERA (Entity-Relationship Attribute)

Business process modelling:– Object Property Relationship OPR Modeling– Role Activity Diagram, RIN (Role Interaction Net)– Action Workflow– REAL: Resources, Events, Agents, Locations– ARIS method

Business process analysis and modelling vs Information Systems

analysis and modelling

Process analys and modeling finds its roots in information systems development (ISD)

Therefore many BPA and BPM techniques originate from information systems analysis an modelling.– Ex: flowcharts, ERM, IDEF

These techniques are particularly suited to model dataflows, process functions and interrelations between data elements and functions

BPA and BPM techniques stem from different fields

system analysis: flow charting organization and method: organizational charts, … work study: text analysis,

ethnomethodology,office process descriptions operations research: Role Interaction Net (based

on Petri Nets) accounting method: ABC-accounting

Tools like ARIS provide a framework to integrate these different methods.

Business Process Analysis

Simple Text Analysis Techniques(Darnton and Darnton, 1997)

Sources of information for business process analysis– text– spoken language– diagrams

How to draw business process models from text or spoken language?

How to draw business process models from diagrams?

Simple Text Analysis Techniques

Text analysis techniques that help you to identify or construct a set of objects, properties, relationships and statements from verbal sources

Key problems in text analysis:– objects, properties, relationships may be

represented using a variety of expressions - apply judgement

Simple Text Analysis Techniques

Key problems in text analysis:– the words used may not say what was intended

to be said (how to figure out the precise term)– pay attention to the specific meaning of words– synonyms: to produce one agreed term– homonyms: words mean different things in

different contexts (introduce more words and terms to account for all the meaning of a word or term)

Simple Text Analysis Techniques

Key problems in text analysis:– recognize ambiguity in words-meaning and resolve it

when necessary

Any model will inevitably be the result of many arbitrary decisions

Suggestions given by the authors:– do not advocate a full analysis of all parts of speech

(or text), but restrict the analysis to a limited number of parts of speech: nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs.

Simple Text Analysis Techniques

Nouns indicates objects Verbs indicates relationships Adjectives/Adverbs indicates properties

Synonyms and homonyms

Issue: how to detect these and to resolve whether they are synonyms and homonyms.

Proposed solution: look at the properties of the terms.

Two terms are synonyms if:– their properties are essentially the same– objects participate in the same relationship types

Terms are homonyms when they have inconsistent properties

Ambiguity

Can occur when different descriptions of the same process depict it in different ways

Example: ”a purchase order is sent to A or B”.– this description is complete but is

ambiguous, as we do not how to decide between A and B

– maybe A and B represent the same entity

Antropomorphism ”the ascription of human attribute or

personality to anything personal or impersonal”– e.g. ”the Purchasing department sends an order

to the supplier”– the Purchasing department is an organizational

unit, and as such does not perform anything; only people within that department can perform operations

– in this case, it is the role of the analyst to see whether there is a need to introduce people as actors who performs the function (send the order)

Text analysis exercise

identify objects, relationships, add comments– (i) identifying the tasks and activities;– (ii) identifying the documents utilized in the

manual business process;– (iii) identifying the participants or agents of

the process– (iv) identifying the inputs (events, resources)

and outputs (products, services, events) of the process.

– (v) identifying the data needed in the process and

– (iv) the computer systems used.

Process modelling methods and techniques

Diagramming techniques:– One of the most common description of process

models– can be in many different forms because there are

many different diagramming techniques for different purposes

– Formal diagram techniques:• Data Flow Diagrams• Process Flowchart: showing a complete process broken

into a series of lower level processes • ANSI Process Flowcharts: Process flowcharts based on

the ANSI Notation

• IDEF, etc

Process modelling methods and techniques

Linguistic Approach– Structured English (Pseudocode)

Object oriented approach– ERA (Entity-Relationship Attribute)

Business process modelling:– Object Property Relationship OPR Modeling– Role Activity Diagram, RIN (Role Interaction Net)– Action Workflow– REAL: Resources, Events, Agents, Locations– ARIS (ARchitecture of Integrated Systems)

Resources for Business Process Modelling Tools– http://www.bpiresearch.com/Resources/Product_Watchlist/

product_watchlist.htm

Data Flow Diagram Represents the flow of data between

different processes within a system Simple, intuitive Business people can understand a

carefully designed DFD, can point out errors and omissions

Focus on flows of data between subprocesses

only four symbols Example

DFD: Limitations

concentrating only on data (or information) objects– focus only on the flow of information; no

symbol for flows of material…

limited vocabulary: no symbols for decision points, sequence of operations, etc.

imprecise about the details of sequence and concurrency

do not show who does what

Flowcharts

Even when DFDs are used extensively, other techniques often used to fill in the details not adequately expressed by DFDs

Flowcharts are diagrams expressing the sequence and logic of procedures using standardized symbols to represent different types of input, output, processing and data storage

Example

IDEF(www.idef.com, + …, USAF ICAM Office, 1981; Mayer et al, 1995)

Icam DEFinition method– originated from ICAM process modelling– each box is an activity or subject which may be de-

composable IDEF0: used for process modelling, but suffers from

being firmly rooted in a data-driven view although has notation for some elements of

behavioural and organizational perspectives, on the whole, it captures only a small variety of process features.

Rooted in the hard, neat and tidy world of information technologists, forces a strictly hierarchical view of human activity

Process Mapping(Rummber and Brache, 1990)

Still a traditional flowchart, with extensions to show organizational responsibility for process steps and performance constraints or goals

cover a broader range of process features than IDEF0

easily understood by business readers Limitation: undirectional flows as the only

relationship between activities means that other types of interaction between people have to be fudged.

Check ”Process mapping”, Marelli A. (2005) – PDF document in Moodle

Structured English (Pseudocode)

Can specify exactly how a procedures operates

to represent the precise logic of a procedure by writing that logic using a few limited forms such as sequence, iteration, and selection using “if-then” or “if-then-else”, “go to”,...

Example:

Role Activity Diagramming RAD

Developed by Anatol Holt (1983) for modelling the ways that people work together, the coordination and interaction in the workplace; especially well suited to business process modelling;

with a concise and rich notation that is easy to read RAD offers good coverage of the functional,

behavioural and organizational perspectives, particularly at the detailed level

RAD has formal basis in Petri-Net theory RAD lacks notations for dataflows

RAD provides four perspectives on Business Process Modelling

Functional: representing what activities are being performed and what data flows connect them

Behavioural: representing when activities are performed, with sequencing, feedback loops, iteration, decision making, triggering conditions, etc.

Organizational: representing where and by whom activities are performed, plus physical communication mechanisms and storage media

Informational: representing the entities (documents, artifacts, products) produced or manipulated y a process, including their structure and inter-relationships

The RAD Notations

Role, Activity, State, State description, etc. Five key concepts that need to be modeled

for a business process• how activities are divided amongst roles• what the organization is trying to reach with the

process: the process goal• what people do to achieve the goals (activities)• how people with groups interact collaboratively to get

the job done: interaction• what constraints the organization puts on what people

can do and how they should operate (the business rules)

What is a role? A set of activities that are generally carried out by an

individual or groups with some organizationally relevant responsibility

associated with the roles are the resources required for performing that role, such as files, desks, tools and skills

each role in a process behaves independently, with its own set of resources and coordinates with other roles as necessary, via interactions. The role is separated from the people who act it.

For example,the project manager role, Chief Accountant role

What is a process goal?

Vertical line to define the point in the process where the

goal can be said to have been achieved the notion of goal is a special case of the

more fundamental concept of state. A goal may be thought of as a state or combination of states that the process is trying to get to

interesting goals are labeled

What is an activity?

A black box , with a state line above it (pre-state that the role must reach for the activity to start) and a line below it (post-state is reached on completion of activity)

The notion of pre-state and post-state allows us to define a sequence of activities precisely.

Interaction between roles

I pass you some info I delegate a task to you We agree on an action You pass me the result of your

work I wait for you to do something

Interaction between roles

Each role box has pre-state and post-state lines attached

The interaction takes place when both roles are in their respective pre-states and finishes with both roles simultaneously entering their post-states. That is, interaction is simply a point of synchronization between roles.

An interaction often involves a transfer of some object (an expense claim, good or services) from one role to another. But it may also not involve the transfer of anything (e.g. just meet to agree on something)

Business Rules

The concepts of role, goal, activity and interaction are represented directly in RAD

The business rules show up as the pattern of sequencing, decision making, and concurrent activity that binds them all together

Events: Indicates places processes start Example

RAD example

Roles

Activities

Interactions

States

Choices (decision points)

RAD

To know more about RAD:– A guide to Role Activity Diagrams, available

at: http://www.sprint.gov.uk/pages.asp?id=77