Business Process Management

408 Pages·2012·8.12 MB·English

Business Process Management
Mathias Weske
Business
Process
Management
Concepts, Languages, Architectures
Second Edition
MathiasWeske
HassoPlattnerInstitute(HPI)
UniversitätPotsdam
Potsdam,Germany
ISBN978-3-642-28615-5 ISBN978-3-642-28616-2(eBook)
DOI10.1007/978-3-642-28616-2
SpringerHeidelbergDordrechtLondonNewYork
LibraryofCongressControlNumber:2012938099
ACMClassification(1998): J.1,H.4.1,D.2.2
©Springer-VerlagBerlinHeidelberg2007,2012
Thisworkissubjecttocopyright.Allrightsarereserved,whetherthewholeorpartofthematerialis
concerned,specificallytherightsoftranslation,reprinting,reuseofillustrations,recitation,broadcasting,
reproductiononmicrofilmorinanyotherway,andstorageindatabanks.Duplicationofthispublication
orpartsthereofispermittedonlyundertheprovisionsoftheGermanCopyrightLawofSeptember9,
1965,initscurrentversion,andpermissionforusemustalwaysbeobtainedfromSpringer.Violationsare
liabletoprosecutionundertheGermanCopyrightLaw.
Theuseofgeneraldescriptivenames,registerednames,trademarks,etc.inthispublicationdoesnotimply,
evenintheabsenceofaspecificstatement,thatsuchnamesareexemptfromtherelevantprotectivelaws
andregulationsandthereforefreeforgeneraluse.
Printedonacid-freepaper
SpringerispartofSpringerScience+BusinessMedia(www.springer.com)
For DJET
Foreword
BusinessProcessManagement(BPM)isa“hottopic”becauseitishighlyrel-
evantfromapracticalpointofviewwhileatthesameitoffersmanychallenges
forsoftwaredevelopersandscientists.Traditionallyinformationsystemsused
information modeling as a starting point, i.e., data-driven approaches have
dominated the information systems landscape. However, over the last decade
it has become clear that processes are equally important and need to be sup-
portedinasystematicmanner.Thisresultedina“wave”ofworkflowmanage-
ment systems in the mid-nineties. These systems aimed at the automation of
structured processes. Therefore, their application wasrestricted to only afew
applicationdomains.However,thebasicworkflowconceptshavebeenadopted
bydifferenttypesof“process-aware”informationsystems.BPMaddressesthe
topic of process support in a broader perspective by incorporating different
types of analysis (e.g., simulation, verification, and process mining) and link-
ing processes to business and social aspects. Moreover, the current interest in
BPM is fueled by technological developments (service oriented architectures)
triggering standardization efforts (cf. languages such as BPMN and BPEL).
Given the huge interest in BPM it is good that Mathias Weske took on
the challenge to write a comprehensive book on BPM. The textbook covers
the broad space of BPM in-depth. Most books on BPM are rather superficial
or closely linked to a particular technology. In this book the topic is viewed
from different angles without becoming superficial. Therefore, it is a valuable
contribution to BPM literature.
The book “Business Process Management: Concepts, Languages, and Ar-
chitectures” is motivated by practical challenges and is grounded in both
computer science and business administration. The subtitle of the book ade-
quately describes its scope. Unlike many other books in this space the focus
is not on a particular notation or XML syntax. Instead the book focuses on
the essential concepts. Different process languages are described (Petri nets,
EPCs, Workflow nets, YAWL, BPMN, etc.) on the basis of these concepts.
Moreover, the different languages are characterized and related using meta
models. This is very important because it provides a view on the essence of
VII
VIII Foreword
business process models and prepares the reader for new languages and stan-
dards that will emerge in the future. Interestingly, the book also contains a
chapteronprocessanalysis.Heredifferentsoundnessnotionsrelevantforpro-
cessverificationaredescribedandrelated.Thelastpartofthebookisrelated
toarchitecturesandmethodologies.Twocriticaltopicsarediscussedindetail:
flexibilityandservicecomposition.Processflexibilityisveryimportantforthe
application of BPM in less structured domains. Through service composition
abridgeisestablishedbetweentheservice-orientedarchitectureandworkflow
technology.
The book provides an excellent introduction into BPM. On the one hand,
the book covers many topics and links concepts to concrete technologies. On
theotherhand,thebookprovidesformaldefinitionsandrelatesthingsthrough
meta modeling. This makes it a superb textbook for students in both com-
puter science and business administration. Moreover, it is also a very useful
book for practitioners since it provides a comprehensive coverage of BPM in-
dependentlyofindustryhypesaroundworkflowmanagement,businessprocess
management, andservice-oriented architectures. Therefore, Iexpect thatthis
book will help organizations in addressing the BPM topic in a more mature
way.
Eindhoven University of Technology, Prof. dr.ir. Wil van der Aalst
July 15th, 2007
Preface to Second Edition
Sincethefirsteditionofthisbookwaspublishedinlate2007,thebusinesspro-
cessmanagementareahasenjoyedanamazingdevelopment,bothinindustry
and academia. To organize change and to achieve higher degrees of automa-
tion, more and more companies and public administrations put processes in
the centre of their attention.
Whilechangingbusinessrequirements,pairedwithcostandtimepressure
are the driving forces of this development, important factors are dependable
standards, sophisticated tools, and well educated people. Many young profes-
sionals graduating in computer science, business engineering, or related fields
haveenjoyedaneducationinbusiness processmanagement, focusingoncom-
plementary topics that range from technical aspects to business aspects.
The business process management area is also fueled by the BPM Aca-
demic Initiative, which provides a professional process modeling and analysis
tool free of charge for users in teaching and academic research. Today more
than ten thousand students, lecturers, and researchers use this platform. I
thank my colleagues in the core team for their involvement, namely Wil van
der Aalst, Frank Leymann, Jan Mendling, Michael zur Mu¨hlen, Jan Recker,
MichaelRosemann,andGeroDecker.Alsointhenameoftheplatformusers,
a special thanks to the Signavio team for providing this service to the BPM
community.
Justlikethefirstedition,thisbookdoesnotcontainanyteachingexercises.
However, students and lecturers working with this book can register at the
BPMAcademicInitiativeatacademic.signavio.comtoaccessacomprehensive
set of teaching material related to this book, and beyond. The material is
published under a Creative Commons license, allowing lecturers to use and
adapt the exercises according to their syllabi. All figures of this book can be
downloaded from bpm-book.com.
It is interesting to see that the increasing adoption of business process
technology poses interesting challenges to the research community. One of
these challenges is to closer relate process models with the actual execution
of the business processes. Since about a decade, an impressive body of work
IX
X Preface to Second Edition
was done in process mining and business process intelligence. There are fur-
ther topics that have emerged as challenges in real-world settings, such as
compliance checking of process models, process model abstraction, and the
management of process repositories, where issues like behavioural similarity
and indexing of process models are investigated. Unfortunately, a text book
on business process management cannot cover all these topics.
Still, this second edition contains a number of enhancements and modi-
fications. The increasing importance of the BPMN in Version 2 is matched
by extending significantly the respective section in the process orchestrations
chapter.IalsoaddedasectiononBPMNintheprocesschoreographieschapter
todiscussthelanguageconstructsforexpressingprocessinteractions,conver-
sations, and choreographies. A concrete consistency criterion for process or-
chestrations implementing behavioural interfaces is introduced, which makes
thediscussionoftheconsistencypropertymoretangible.Intheprocessprop-
erties chapter, I extended the section on data in processes, which now also
covers properties of a business process with respect to the data objects it
works on. To improve the integration of the business process management
methodology with the concepts introduced in the first part of the book, I
rewrote the methodology chapter. It now discusses the relationships between
business processes in much more detail and it also introduces performance
indicators for business processes and concepts on how to measure them.
Inadditiontotheseextensionsofthebook,therearemanyminorchanges,
which, I hope, will increase its readability and soundness. Quite a number of
them were triggered by readers, whose feedback I am happy to acknowledge.
Thanks to all members of my research group at HPI; your comments and
remarksonearlierversionsofthismanuscripthavehelpedimprovingthebook.
Special thanks to Matthias Kunze and Alexander Lu¨bbe for their feedback,
mainly on the BPMN sections. I would also like to thank the Berliner BPM
Offensive for providing me with the stencil set of the BPMN shapes. The
shapes are much nicer than I could ever do them, they helped a lot!
Potsdam, March 2012 M.W.
Preface
The extensive ground covered by business process management is divided
between representatives from two communities: business administration and
computer science. Due to the increasingly important role of information sys-
tems inthe realizationofbusiness processes, acommonunderstanding ofand
productive interaction between these communities are essential.
Due to different viewpoints, however, the interaction between these com-
munities is seldom seamless. Business administration professionals tend to
consider information technology as a subordinate aspect in business process
management that experts will take care of. On the other hand, computer sci-
enceprofessionalsoftenconsiderbusinessgoalsandorganizationalregulations
as terms that do not deserve much thought, but require the appropriate level
of abstraction.
This book argues that we need to have a common understanding of the
different aspects of business process management addressed by all communi-
ties involved. Robust and correct realization of business processes in software
that increases customer satisfaction and ultimately contributes to the com-
petitive advantage of an enterprise can only be achieved through productive
communication between these communities.
By structuring business process management, this book aims at providing
a step towards a better understanding of the concepts involved in business
process management—from the perspective of a computer scientist.
If business persons find the book too technical, software people find it too
non-technical, and formal persons find it too imprecise, but all of them have
a better understanding of the ground covered by our discipline, this book has
achieved its goal.
The Web site bpm-book.com contains additional information related to this
book, such as links to references that are available online and exercises that
facilitate the reader’s getting into deeper contact with the topics addressed.
Teaching material is also available at that Web site.
XI