Search results

In the last two decades, a proliferation of business process management (BPM) modeling languages, standards and software systems has given rise to much confusion and obstacles to adoption. Since new BPM languages and notation terminologies were not well defined, duplicate features are common. This paper seeks to make sense of the myriad BPM standards, organising them in a classification framework, and to identify key industry trends.

An extensive literature review is conducted and relevant BPM notations, languages and standards are referenced against the proposed BPM Standards Classification Framework, which lists each standard's distinct features, strengths and weaknesses.

The paper is unaware of any classification of BPM languages. An attempt is made to classify BPM languages, standards and notations into four main groups: execution, interchange, graphical, and diagnosis standards. At the present time, there is a lack of established diagnosis standards. It is hoped that such a classification facilitates the meaningful adoption of BPM languages, standards and notations.

The paper differentiates BPM standards, thereby resolving common misconceptions; establishes the need for diagnosis standards; identifies the strengths and limitations of current standards; and highlights current knowledge gaps and future trends. Researchers and practitioners may wish to position their work around this review.

Currently, to the best of one's knowledge, such an overview and such an analysis of BPM standards have not so far been undertaken.

This paper aims to present Long4Cloud (long-running workflows execution environment for cloud), a distributed and adaptive LRW execution environment delivered “as a service” solution.

LRWs last for hours, days or even months and their duration open the possibility of changes in business rules, service interruptions or even alterations of formal regulations of the business before the workflow completion. These events can lead to problems such as loss of intermediary results or exhaustion of computational resources used to manage the workflow execution. Existing solutions face those problems by merely allowing the replacement (at runtime) of services associated with activities of the LRW.

LONG4Cloud extends the previous works in two main aspects, namely, the inclusion of dynamic reconfiguration capabilities and the adoption of an “as a service” delivery mode. The reconfiguration mechanism uses quiescence principles, data and state management and provides multiple adaptive strategies. Long4Cloud also adopts a scenario-based analysis to decide the adaptation to be performed. Events such as changes in business rules or service failures trigger reconfigurations supported by the environment. These features have been put together in a solution delivered “as a service” that takes advantage of cloud elasticity and allows to better allocate cloud resources to fit into the demands of LRWs.

The original contribution of Long4Cloud is to incorporate adaptive capabilities into the LRW execution environment as an effective way to handle the specificities of this kind of workflow. Experiments using current data of a Brazilian health insurance company were carried out to evaluate Long4Cloud and show performance gains in the execution of LRWs submitted to the proposed environment.

Concurrency is a desirable property that enhances workflow efficiency. The purpose of this paper is to propose six polynomial-time algorithms that collectively maximize control flow concurrency for Business Process Model and Notation (BPMN) workflow models. The proposed algorithms perform model-level transformations on a BPMN model during the design phase of the model, thereby improving the workflow model’s execution efficiency.

The approach is similar to source code optimization, which solely works with syntactic means. The first step makes implicit synchronizations of interdependent concurrent control flows explicit by adding parallel gateways. After that, every control flow can proceed asynchronously. The next step then generates an equivalent sequence of execution hierarchies for every control flow such that they collectively provide maximum concurrency for the control flow. As a whole, the proposed algorithms add a valuable feature to a BPMN modeling tool to maximize control flow concurrency.

In addition, this paper introduces the concept of control flow independence, which is a user-determined semantic property of BPMN models that cannot be obtained by any syntactic means. But, if control flow independence holds in a BPMN model, the model’s determinism is guaranteed. As a result, the proposed algorithms output a model that can be proved to be equivalent to the original model.

This paper adds value to BPMN modeling tools by providing polynomial-time algorithms that collectively maximize control flow concurrency in a BPMN model during the design phase of the model. As a result, the model’s execution efficiency will increase. Similar to source code optimization, these algorithms perform model-level transformations on a BPMN model through syntactic means; and the transformations performed to each control flow are guaranteed to be equivalent to the control flow. Furthermore, a case study on a real-life new employee preparation process is provided to demonstrate the proposed algorithms’ usefulness on increasing the process’s execution efficiency.

The aim of this article is to present the relationship between the nature of business processes (BPs) and the nature of knowledge used in the course of their execution on the basis of an analysis of the relevance of different dimensions of BPs. The conclusion presented herein points to the inextricable relationship between business process management (BPM) and knowledge management (KM) in the knowledge economy (KE).

The paper is conceptual in nature and is grounded in the theories of BPM and KM.

The article analyses the significance of the changing nature of BPs for particular dimensions of BPs, as well as the relationships between the nature of BPs and the kinds of knowledge used in subsequent stages of the BPM Lifecycle. These relationships, which are primarily tied to the dimensions of BP Unpredictability and Knowledge-intensity, should be taken into account in each element of the BPM ecosystem to a larger degree, the larger the significance of processes which require dynamic management in an organization.

The article is a contribution to the theoretical reflection on the holistic approach to BPM. It expressly points to the inevitable necessity of integration (dynamic) BPM with KM, with the exception of the specific case of traditional BPM, which encompasses structured BPs. This integration requires us to take into account the influence of KM in virtually all of the elements of the BPM ecosystem.

The article points to the necessity of researching the nature of executed and managed BPs as early as in the course of preparing the organization to implement BPM in the KE. The aim is to select and/or adapt implementation methodologies and systems, supporting BPM in the organization to the real BPs nature. The analysis presented in the article on the dimensions of BPs points to the particular significance of the method of adjusting elements of the BPM ecosystem in the execution and analysis and diagnosis stages of the BPM lifecycle.

The article presents an original view of the interrelations between BPM and KM in the knowledge intensive organizations (KIOs) in the KE.

Changes in workflow relevant data of business processes at run-time can hinder their completion or impact their profitability as they have been instantiated under different circumstances. The purpose of this paper is to propose a context engine to enhance a business process management (BPM) system’s context-awareness. The generic architecture provides the flexibility to configure processes during initialization as well as to adapt running instances at decision gates or during execution due to significant context change.

The paper discusses context-awareness as the conceptual background. The technological capabilities of business rules and complex event processing (CEP) are outlined in an architecture design. A reference process is proposed and discussed in an exemplary application.

The results provide an improvement over the current situation of static variable instantiation of business processes with local information. The proposed architecture extends the well-known combination of business rules and BPM systems with a context engine based on CEP.

The resulting architecture for a BPM system using a context engine is generic in nature and, hence, requires to be contextualized for situated implementations. Implementation success is dependent on the availability of context information and process compensation options.

Practitioners receive advice on a reference architecture and technology choices for implementing systems, which can provide and monitor context information for business processes as well as intervene and adapt the execution.

Currently, there is no multi-purpose non-proprietary context engine based on CEP or any other technology available for BPM, which facilitates the adaptation of processes at run-time due to changes in context variables. This paper will stimulate a debate between research and practice on suitable design and technology.

Aims to show that workflow management needs to rethink its basis of discussion in order to meet today's challenges and to provide adequate IT support for heterogeneous workflow networks.

First, the need for flexibility in relating resources in workflow management is examined in more detail. Second, some approaches to managing workflows in heterogeneous networks are inspected and it is found that all of these improve flexibility on the basis of contracting services. Third, it is elaborated how processing by contract supports decentralized resource management through dynamically interrelating social and technical services driven by a cycle (“wheel”) of execution and monitoring, evaluation and demand, as well as selecting and contracting.

Conclusions are drawn for systems architecture and implementation to guide the design of internet‐enabled workflow support.

Important questions for the research agenda are: how can one enrich application‐oriented workflow modelling languages in order to describe processes as consisting of heterogeneous services? How should one design and implement workflow engines which enable the turning of the “wheel” with the support of integrating human activities and technical agency as workflow process services?

The idea of processing by contract may lead to new workflow concepts and technology to meet the challenges of an internet economy based on the “pay as you go” principle.

Whereas the workflow paradigm of the past may be phrased as processing by definition, i.e. process execution according to predefined process patterns and resource relations, the idea of processing by contract is suggested, i.e. a mode of process execution driven by recurrent process evaluation and service contracting.

Declarative process modelling is a constraint-centric approach that treats business rules as first-class citizens in business process models. Augmenting the declarative process modelling technique with capability to detect the constraint violations during business process execution is of crucial importance. The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the modelling of business rules through a repository of pattern-oriented templates.

The semantics of the business rule templates is underpinned by linear temporal logic (LTL). Automated temporal reasoning is then conducted for determining whether process executions adhere to the business rules through the utilisation of the Logics Workbench (LWB). An application of the methodological framework is illustrated by a realistic case study on degree requirements verification.

To access the practicality of the approach, the case study of this paper is based on the verification of degree requirements, which is different from the domain area of the case study in the author’s prior work. The findings indicated that the temporal framework could be applied to the declarative process modelling in a consistent and efficient manner.

This paper is an extended version of the author’s earlier study. More details on the LTL and LWB are provided in the current study. The author introduces 17 new business rule templates and illustrates the utilisation of the new templates via a case study that belongs to a different domain area.

The purpose of this paper is to present a framework for social business process management (BPM) in which social tagging is used to capture process knowledge emerging during the design and enactment of the processes. Process knowledge concerns both the type of activities chosen to fulfil a certain goal and the skills and experience of users in executing specific tasks. This knowledge is exploited by recommendation tools to support the design and enactment of current and future process instances.

The literature about traditional BPM is analysed to highlight the limitations of traditional BPM regarding management of ad hoc and semi-structured processes. Having identified this gap, an innovative BPM framework based on social tagging is proposed to address these limitations. This model is exemplified in a real case scenario and evaluated through the implementation of a prototype and a case study in real world non-profit organisation.

An overview of the social BPM framework is presented, introducing the concepts of role and task recommendation, which are supported by social tagging. The prototype shows the buildability of the social BPM framework as an extension of a Wiki platform. The case study demonstrates that the social BPM framework improves user collaborativeness in designing and executing process instances.

The applicability of the framework is targeted to ad hoc and possibly semi-structured business processes and it does not extend to highly procedural and codified processes. A single case study limits the generalisability of the evaluation results.

The social BPM framework is the first to introduce task and role recommendation supported by social tagging to overcome the limitations of traditional BPM models.

An integral part of declarative process modelling is to guarantee that the execution of a declarative workflow is compliant with the respective business rules. The purpose of this paper is to establish a formal framework for representing business rules and determining whether any business rules are violated during the executions of declarative process models.

In the approach, a business rule is phrased in terms of restricted English that is related to a constraint template. Linear temporal logic (LTL) is employed as a formalism for defining the set of constraint templates. By exploiting the theorem-proving feature of the Logics Workbench (LWB), business rule violations are then detected in an automatic manner.

This study explored the viability of encoding: first, process executions by means of LTL and second, business rules in terms of restricted English that built upon pattern-oriented templates and LTL. The LWB was used for carrying out temporal reasoning through automated techniques. The applicability of the formal verification approach was exemplified by a case study concerning supply chain management. The findings showed that practical reasoning could be achieved by combining declarative process modelling, restricted English, pattern-oriented templates, LTL and LWB.

First, new business rule templates are proposed; second, business rules are expressed in restricted English instead of graphical constructs; third, both finite execution trace and business rules are grounded in LTL. There is no need to deal with the semantic differences between different formalisms; and finally, the theorem prover LWB is used for the conformance checking of a finite execution trace against business rules.

The purpose of this study is to give an in-depth understanding of the nature of business processes (BPs) from the perspective of their dynamism and knowledge intensity that will allow for their correct classification and provide practical and useful implications for their more relevant and effective management. A simple and low labor-intensive BP nature assessment approach is proposed that will allow for objective assessment and internal benchmarking of all BPs in a specific context of execution based on their nature.

The research is divided into two parts. The first comprises a systematic literature review (SLR) based on the resources of the ProQuest, Springer Nature and ScienceDirect full-text databases and the second includes illustrative case studies.

Building on the SLR, the authors identified and reviewed 3,385 articles and defined a set of criteria by which the nature of BPs can be assessed. Further, the authors proposed a BP nature assessment matrix together with complementary questionnaires for the evaluation of process dynamism and knowledge intensity. To demonstrate the logic of this approach, two illustrative case studies were presented.

The article contributes to the theoretical reflection on the nature of BPs in the knowledge economy. From the practical point of view, a novel approach to the assessment of the nature of BPs is offered. The approach is open and as experience is accumulated it will develop according to the data and recommendations collected.