Eindhoven University of Technology Faculty of Technology Management

1. Eindhoven University of Technology Faculty of Technology Management Department of Information Systems P.O. Box 513 5600 MB Eindhoven The Netherlands w.m.p.v.d.aalst@tm.tue.nl Workflow/Business Process Management Introduction business process management and workflow management Wil van der Aalst

2. Overview of this course Business Process Management process mining • Relation with BPR (Re)design of workflows Resource management Logistical aspects Analysis of workflows Staffware Patterns Protos Concepts Guidelines FLOWer Workflow management systems Simulation Techniques for business process modelling Interorganizational workflow Adaptive workflow With or without WFMS Workflow management

3. Relevant WWW sites • http://www.workflowcourse.com • http://www.workflowpatterns.com • http://www.processmining.org • http://is.tm.tue.nl/ • http://is.tm.tue.nl/staff/wvdaalst • http://www.wfmc.org • http://www.aiim.org • http://www.waria.com • http://www.workflow-research.de • http://www.sigpam.org • http://www.pallas-athena.com/ • http://www.staffware.com • http://is.tm.tue.nl/research/woflan/ • http://www.exspect.com • http://www.ids-scheer.com

4. WARNINGIt is not sufficient to understand the workflow models. You have to be able to design them yourself !

5. WARNINGStart early with the assignment and tools: You really need the time !!

6. Context- role of models and trends -

7. Focus on models

8. Some trends in Information Systems • From programming to assembling • From data orientation to process orientation • From design to redesign and organic growth operating system generic applications domain specific applications tailor-made applications

9. Before BPM: WFM- workflow management -

10. Workflow management Goal To manage the flow of work such that the work is done at the right time by the proper person. Definitions A workflow management system (WFMS) is a software package that can be used to support the definition, management and execution of workflow processes. A workflow system (WFS) is a system based on a WFMS that supports a specific set of business processes through the execution of computerized process definitions

11. UIMS UIMS appl. appl. appl. appl. DBMS DBMS DBMS WFMS OS OS OS OS 1965-1975 1975-1985 1985-1995 1995-2005 Relevance of workflow management systems Trend: • Processes: • are becoming more important (BPR) • are subject to frequent changes • are becoming more complex • are increasing in number Þ Workflow Management System

12. processes resources WFMS applications The basic idea: • separation of processes, resources and applications • focus on the logistics of work processes, not on the contents of individual tasks

13. BPM: The next step- business process management -

14. Business Process Management (BPM) • “True Business Process Management is an amalgam of traditional workflow and the 'new' BPM technology. It then follows that as BPM is a natural extension of – and not a separate technology to – Workflow, BPM is in fact the merging of process technology covering 3 process categories: interactions between (i) people-to-people; (ii) systems-to-systems and (iii) systems-to-people – all from a process-centric perspective. This is what true BPM is all about.” Jon Pyke, CTO Staffware. • “…a blending of process management/workflow with application integration.” David McCoy, Gartner Group

15. Alternative view on BPM: The BPM life-cycle

16. 1993

17. 1998

18. 2003

19. 2008 ???

20. BPR, CPI, Office logistics- relationships to other domains -

21. Business Process Reengineering (BPR) (Business Process Redesign) • Hammer and Champy: "Reengineering the corporation" (1993) • Keywords: • fundamental • radical • dramatic • process • The "organize before automate"-principle is replaced by "process thinking".

22. Processes and the organization

23. high CPI chaos BPR BPR impact CPI change CPI BPR stagnation CPI low low high time frequency Continuous Process Improvement (CPI) • Instead of of seeking a radical breakthrough, optimizing the process by continuous, incremental improvements. • Part of the Total Quality Management (TQM) approach("doing it right the first time", "eliminate waste", ...) BPR and CPI are both process centric and can be supported by a WFMS.

24. Making a copy is easy and cheap. There are no real limitations with respect to the in-process inventory. There are less requirements with respect to the order in which activities are executed. Quality is difficult to measure. Quality of end-products may vary. Differences between information logistics and production logistics • Transportation of electronic data is timeless. • Production to stock is seldom possible. • Loops or rework occurs frequently in administrative processes, but are very seldom or even impossible in production processes. • The customer (can) influence(s) the handling in an administrative process. The difference between design and control is fading!

25. History and CSCW- the WFM/BPM market -

26. Historical overview of systems (Zur Muehlen, 2003)

27. (Zur Muehlen, 2003) • Workflow management is already 25 years old (cf. OfficeTalk, Skip Ellis/Xerox)! • The WFM hype is over …, but there are more and more applications, and WFM is adopted by many other technologies (ERP, Web Services, etc.).

28. CSCW spectrum

29. Refined view (without datbase applications)

30. Trade-offs

31. human oriented system oriented groupware workflow transaction processing P2P = Person To Person A2P = Application To Person A2A = Application To Application

32. Focus on "classical" workflow management systems, but ... Four types of "workflow-like" systems: • Information systems with hard-coded workflows (process& organization specific). • Custom-made information systems with generic workflow support (organization specific). • Generic softwarewith embedded workflow functionality (e.g., the workflow components of ERP, CRM, PDM, etc. systems). • Generic softwarefocusing onworkflow functionality (e.g., Staffware, MQSeries Workflow, FLOWer, COSA, Oracle BPEL, Filenet, etc.).

33. WFM architecture- reference model and example -

34. Reference model of the Workflow Management Coalition What? When? Who?

39. Workflow perspectives- processes dominate! -

40. Workflow perspectives • Process perspective (tasks and the routing of cases) • Resource perspective (workers, roles, 4-eyes principle, etc.) • Case/data perspective (process instances and their attributes) • Operation/application perspective (forms, application integration, etc.) • ...

41. Process perspective: Protos (extended Petri nets)

42. Process perspective: Staffware

43. Process perspective: COSA (Petri nets)

44. Process perspective: Baan DEM

45. Process perspective: Event driven process chains (ARIS/SAP)

46. <sequence name="main"> <flow name="Flow_1"> <links> <link name="receive-to-assess"/> <link name="receive-to-approval"/> <link name="approval-to-reply"/> <link name="assess-to-setMessage"/> <link name="setMessage-to-reply"/> <link name="assess-to-approval"/> </links> <sequence name="sequenceReceive"> <source linkName="receive-to-assess" transitionCondition="bpws:getVariableData('inputVariable','payload','/client:LoanApprovalProcessRequest/client:amount') &lt; 10000"/> <source linkName="receive-to-approval" transitionCondition="bpws:getVariableData('inputVariable','payload','/client:LoanApprovalProcessRequest/client:amount') &gt;= 10000"/> <receive name="receiveInput" partnerLink="client" portType="client:LoanApproval" operation="initiate" variable="inputVariable" createInstance="yes"/> </sequence> <sequence name="sequenceAssess"> <target linkName="receive-to-assess"/> <source linkName="assess-to-setMessage" transitionCondition="bpws:getVariableData('risk') = 'low'"/> <source linkName="assess-to-approval" transitionCondition="bpws:getVariableData('risk') != 'low'"/> <assign name="initiateAssessor"> <copy> <from variable="inputVariable" part="payload" query="/client:LoanApprovalProcessRequest/client:firstName"/> <to variable="invokeAssessor_initiate_InputVariable" part="payload" query="/ns1:AssessorProcessRequest/ns1:firstName"/> </copy> <copy> <from variable="inputVariable" part="payload" query="/client:LoanApprovalProcessRequest/client:name"/> <to variable="invokeAssessor_initiate_InputVariable" part="payload" query="/ns1:AssessorProcessRequest/ns1:name"/> </copy> <copy> <from variable="inputVariable" part="payload" query="/client:LoanApprovalProcessRequest/client:amount"/> <to variable="invokeAssessor_initiate_InputVariable" part="payload" query="/ns1:AssessorProcessRequest/ns1:amount"/> </copy> </assign> <invoke name="invokeAssessor" partnerLink="Assessor" portType="ns1:Assessor" operation="initiate" inputVariable="invokeAssessor_initiate_InputVariable"/> <receive name="receiveAssessor" partnerLink="Assessor" portType="ns1:AssessorCallback" operation="onResult" variable="receiveAssessor_onResult_InputVariable" createInstance="no"/> <assign name="completeAssessor"> <copy> <from variable="receiveAssessor_onResult_InputVariable" part="payload" query="/ns1:AssessorProcessResponse/ns1:level"/> <to variable="risk"/> </copy> </assign> </sequence> <sequence name="sequenceNoApproval"> <target linkName="assess-to-setMessage"/> <source linkName="setMessage-to-reply"/> <assign name="setAccepted"> <copy> <from expression="'Accepted'"/> <to variable="outputVariable" part="payload" query="/client:LoanApprovalProcessResponse/client:result"/> </copy> </assign> </sequence> (Oracle) BPEL

47. Petri nets as a basis • The process perspective is the most dominant one. • There are many modeling techniques and tools • BPEL, BPMN, DFD, ISAC, SADT, PN, HLPN, PA, FC, UML, ... • Simulation tools, design tools, CASE tools, WFMS, ... • Focus on the essential concepts rather than (system-)specific languages. • Approach in this course (1) first master workflow modeling in terms of workflow nets (a subset of Petri nets), and (2) only then look into mappings to and from (system-)specific languages.

48. Example of a process model: A Petri net modeling order processing

49. Play the token game …

50. Test Exercise: Dining philosophers • 5 philosophers sharing 5 chopsticks: chopsticks are located in-between philosophers • A philosopher is either in state eating or thinking and needs two chopsticks to eat. • Model as a Petri net.