Pnina Soffer

Process Mining Manifesto

Process mining techniques are able to extract knowledge from event logs commonly available in today’s information systems. These techniques provide new means to discover, monitor, and improve processes in a variety of application domains. There are two main drivers for the growing interest in process mining. On the one hand, more and more events are being recorded, thus, providing detailed information about the history of processes. On the other hand, there is a need to improve and support business processes in competitive and rapidly changing environments. This manifesto is created by the IEEE Task Force on Process Mining and aims to promote the topic of process mining. Moreover, by defining a set of guiding principles and listing important challenges, this manifesto hopes to serve as a guide for software developers, scientists, consultants, business managers, and end-users. The goal is to increase the maturity of process mining as a new tool to improve the (re)design, control, and support of operational business processes.

ERP modeling: a comprehensive approach

We present a generic reverse engineering process, aimed at developing a model that captures the available alternatives at different application levels of an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system. Such a model is needed when ERP systems are aligned with the needs of the enterprise in which they are implemented. In order to support the ERP implementation process, the model should describe the entire scope of the ERP systems functionality and the alternative business processes it supports, as well as the interdependencies among them. We analyze the desired properties a modeling language should satisfy to be applied in constructing an ERP system modal. This analysis, which follows the Cooperative Requirements Engineering With Scenarios classification framework in its adapted ERP modeling form, results in a set of criteria for evaluating modeling languages for this purpose. Using these criteria, we evaluate the Object-Process modeling Methodology and apply it for generating a detailed ERP system model. The generic process and detailed criteria we develop can serve for comprehensive ERP modeling, as well as for obtaining a model of other process-supportive off-the-shelf systems that are of generic and configurable nature.

On the notion of soft‐goals in business process modeling

Purpose – The paper aims at providing a conceptual framework based on clearly defined concepts and notions, which integrates goals into process modeling and specifically distinguishes goals from soft‐goals or business measures. The application of this framework facilitates a systematic use of soft‐goals in process design.Design/methodology/approach – The framework is developed on the basis of Bunges well‐established ontology. It is applied to processes taken from the SCOR supply chain reference model for demonstration and evaluation.Findings – Applying the framework to the SCOR processes resulted in a set of focused relations between soft‐goals and processes, as opposed to the ones suggested originally in the SCOR model. This demonstrates the usefulness of the framework in process design.Research limitations/implications – The approach presented in the paper is still rather a theoretical framework than a fully validated procedure. It should be tested on larger‐scale cases in more practical settings and e...

Goal-driven analysis of process model validity

Business process modeling and design, which has attracted much attention in recent years, emphasizes mainly graphical representation, usually without an underlying theory. The lack of a theoretical foundation causes several important issues to remain intuition- rather than theory -based. In particular, many process-modeling methods, being semi-formal, lack a mechanism for verifying the ”correctness” of a process in terms of completeness, consistency, and feasibility. The paper proposes a generic theory-based process modeling (GPM) framework and criteria for validity evaluation of process models. The framework, which is based on Bunge’s ontology, is formal and notation- independent. Validity is defined as the possibility of the process to achieve its goal. The paper discusses and characterizes causes for process invalidity and suggests ways to avoid these situations. The concepts of the framework and their usefulness for evaluating the validity of process models are demonstrated by applying them to a process taken from the Supply-Chain Operations Reference-model (SCOR).

Aligning an ERP system with enterprise requirements: An object-process based approach

One of the main problems in ERP implementation projects is how to align an off-the-shelf software package with the business processes of the enterprise implementing it. The paper proposes a requirement-driven approach, which benefits from reusing the business process design without being restricted by predefined solutions and criteria. The approach applies an iterative alignment process, which employs an algorithm that matches a model of the enterprise requirements with a model of the ERP system capabilities. The algorithm identifies possible matches between the two models and evaluates the gaps between them despite differences in their completeness and detail level. It provides the enterprise with a set of feasible combinations of requirements that can be satisfied by the ERP system as a basis for making implementation decisions. We use Object-Process Methodology (OPM) to model both the ERP system and the enterprise requirements, and utilize the pair of resulting OPM models as input for the matching algorithm. The alignment algorithm has been tested in an experimental study, whose encouraging results demonstrate the ability of the approach to provide a satisfactory solution to the problem of aligning an ERP software package with an enterprise business model.

Modelling Off-the-Shelf Information Systems Requirements: An Ontological Approach

Requirements for choosing off-the-shelf information systems (OISR) differ from requirements for development of new information systems in that they do not necessarily provide complete specifications, thus allowing flexibility in matching an existing IS to the stated needs. We present a framework for OISR conceptual models that consists of four essential elements: business processes, business rules, information objects and required system services. We formalise the definitions of these concepts based on an ontological model. The ontology-based OISR model provides a framework to evaluate modelling languages on how appropriate they are for OISR requirements specifications. The evaluation framework is applied to the Object-Process Methodology, and its results are compared with a similar evaluation of ARIS. This comparison demonstrates the effectiveness of the ontological framework for evaluating modelling tools on how well they can guide selection, implementation and integration of purchased software packages.

Information Systems Evolution

This book constitutes the post-conference proceedings of the CAiSE Forum from the 22nd International Conference on Advanced Information Systems Engineering (CAiSE 2010), held in Hammamet, Tunisia, June 9, 2010. While the CAiSE conference itself focuses on papers that report on matured research, the CAiSE forum was created specifically as a platform to present fresh ideas, new concepts, and new and innovative systems, tools, and applications. The 22 papers presented in this volume were carefully reviewed and selected from 32 submissions. The reworked and extended versions of the original presentations cover topics such as business process management, enterprise architecture and modeling, service-oriented architectures, and requirements engineering.

Extending the Adaptability of Reference Models

Reference models are an important aid for business process modeling and design. Their aim is to capture domain knowledge and assist in the design of enterprise-specific business processes. The application of reference models for process design requires guidance in reusing these models and flexibility in adapting them to specific enterprises. One popular modeling language for specifying reference models is event-driven process chain (EPC), which has been extended to express configurable reference models, i.e., configurable EPC (C-EPC). These models provide explicit reuse guidance but allow a limited level of flexibility following a reuse by configuration approach. To increase the level of adaptability of reference models, in this paper, we propose to utilize the application-based domain modeling (ADOM) approach to specify and apply reference models by using EPC. ADOM supports the enforcement of reference model constraints while allowing high levels of flexibility, adaptability, and variability in the business processes of particular enterprises. This paper presents the syntax and semantics of the proposed approach, called ADOM-EPC, and its specialization and configuration capabilities. ADOM-EPC is evaluated by comparing it to C-EPC, a leading approach for reference modeling and reuse, in terms of expressiveness and comprehensibility. Although the expressiveness of ADOM-EPC, i.e., its set of specified reuse operations, exceeds that of C-EPC, the understandability of the two types of reference models is similar.

The role of domain knowledge in requirements elicitation via interviews: an exploratory study

Requirements elicitation is the first activity in the requirements engineering process. It includes learning, surfacing, and discovering the requirements of the stakeholders of the developed system. Various elicitation techniques exist to help analysts elicit the requirements from the different stakeholders; the most commonly used technique is the interview. Analysts may have domain knowledge prior to the elicitation process. Such knowledge is commonly assumed to have positive effects on requirements engineering processes, in that it fosters communication, and a mutual understanding of the needs. However, to a minor extent, some negative effects have also been reported. This paper presents an empirical study in which the perceived and actual effects of prior domain knowledge on requirements elicitation via interviews were examined. The results indicate that domain knowledge affects elicitation via interview in two main aspects: communication with the customers and understanding their needs. The findings provide insights as to both the positive and negative effects of domain knowledge on requirements elicitation via interview, as perceived by participants with and without domain knowledge, and show the existence of an actual effect on the course of the interviews. Furthermore, these insights can be utilized in practice to support analysts in the elicitation process and to form requirements analysis teams. They highlight the different contributions that can be provided by analysts with different levels of domain knowledge in requirements analysis teams and the synergy that can be gained by forming heterogeneous teams of analysts.

Improving business process decision making based on past experience

Business processes entail a large number of decisions that affect their business performance. The criteria used in these decisions are not always formally specified and optimized. The paper develops a semi-automated approach that improves the business performance of processes by deriving decision criteria from the experience gained through past process executions. The premise that drives the approach is that it is possible to identify a process path that would yield best performance at a given context. The approach uses data mining techniques to identify the relationships between context, path decisions, and process outcomes, and derives decision rules from these relationships. It is evaluated using a simulation of a manufacturing process, whose results demonstrate the potential of improving the business performance through the rules generated by the approach.