Business process modelling:: Review and framework

A business process is the combination of a set of activities within an enterprise with a structure describing their logical order and dependence whose objective is to produce a desired result. Business process modelling enables a common understanding and analysis of a business process. A process model can provide a comprehensive understanding of a process. An enterprise can be analysed and integrated through its business processes. Hence the importance of correctly modelling its business processes. Using the right model involves taking into account the purpose of the analysis and, knowledge of the available process modelling techniques and tools. The number of references on business modelling is huge, thus making it very time consuming to get an overview and understand many of the concepts and vocabulary involved. The primary concern of this paper is to make that job easier, i.e. review business process modelling literature and describe the main process modelling techniques. Also a framework for classifying business process-modelling techniques according to their purpose is proposed and discussed. (C) 2003 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.