بهره برداری درونی جریان کار ؛ کسب و کار به کسب و کار مبتنی بر فرایند مشاهده

When cooperating with each other, enterprises must closely monitor internal processes and those of partners to streamline business-to-business (B2B) workflows. This work applies the process-view model, which extends beyond conventional activity-based process models, to design workflows across multiple enterprises. A process-view is an abstraction of an implemented process. An enterprise can design various process-views for different partners based on diverse commercial relationships and, in doing so, establish an integrated process that consists of internal processes and process-views that each partner provides. Participatory enterprises can obtain appropriate progress information from their own integrated processes, allowing them to collaborate effectively. Furthermore, B2B workflows are coordinated through virtual states of process-views. This work develops a uniform approach to manage state mappings between internal processes and process-views. The proposed approach enhances prevalent activity-based process models adaptable to collaborative environments

Enterprises cooperate strategically to develop a competitive business alliance or virtual enterprise. Cooperative relationships are formed by merging the operational processes of participants. Workflow technology enables an enterprise to construct a process-oriented organization efficiently. Business-to-business (B2B) workflows are streamlined if value-added activities are arranged from a process-oriented aspect as well as controlled automatically by integrating workflow management systems (WfMS) of participatory enterprises. However, managing workflows among multiple enterprises is more complex than doing so for an individual enterprise. To remain competitive, a cooperating enterprise must conceal its internal process structures. However, collaborating enterprises must exchange business information. For example, a notebook computer manufacturer may submit a purchase order to a hard disk manufacturer. In addition to the data required for interaction, if an enterprise provides adequate progress status, its partners may respond as anticipated. For example, if the notebook company exposes appropriate progress data of its assembly workflow, then the hard disk manufacturer may deliver products just in time. Thus, the notebook company can reduce the stock cost required for storing materials such as hard disks. Moreover, distributed and heterogeneous WfMSs of cooperating enterprises must be integrated to automate B2B workflows. From the perspective of decision support, a WfMS offers an integrated environment for decision makers to analyze, simulate, design, enact, control, and monitor the overall business processes of an enterprise. As the outsourced tasks grow, workflows extend across several enterprises. Workflow technology is expected to support decision-making within an interorganizational environment, just as it does within a single enterprise. Our previous study [17] proposed a process-view model that enhances the capability of process abstraction in conventional activity-based process models [7]. A process-view, i.e., a virtual process, is abstracted from an actual process. According to distinct organizational roles' requirements, a process modeler can design various process-views, hence providing the appropriate process information to each participant. However, the preliminary process-view model does not consider managing workflows within interorganizational collaboration. This work proposes a process-view-based coordination model that extends the preliminary process-view model [17] to effectively address the issues of managing B2B workflows. A process-view abstracts critical commercial secrets and is an external interface of an internal process. An enterprise can design various process-views, which are unique to each partner. Process-views of participatory enterprises comprise a collaboration workflow. Moreover, this work employs virtual states to coordinate B2B workflows. The virtual states (execution states) of a process-view represent progress status of an internal process. A uniform means is developed to manage state mappings between internal processes and process-views. An enterprise can monitor and control the progress of partners' processes through the virtual states of their process-views. Furthermore, data abstraction is proposed to derive meaningful process-view relevant data since our previous work focus only on the control flow of process-views. With these extensions, the enhanced process-view model contains a modeling tool that can accurately describe interorganizational workflows as well as an interoperation mechanism to coordinate autonomous, heterogeneous and distributed WfMSs. The rest of this paper is organized as follows. Section 2 presents the process-view model and its applications within inter-enterprise cooperation. Section 3 then summarizes how to define an order-preserving process-view as presented in Ref. [17]. In addition, data abstraction is proposed for deriving process-view relevant data. Next, Section 4 presents the coordination of B2B workflows through the virtual states of process-views. Section 5 presents a prototype to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed approach. Section 6 then discusses some properties of the process-view-based approach and reviews related work in collaborative workflow management. Conclusions are finally made in Section 7.

This work has presented a process-view-based coordination model for B2B workflow management. A process-view is an abstracted process that can be viewed as an external interface of an internal process. Representation and usage of process-views are compatible with conventional activity-based process models. This work also offers a systematic approach for creating an interoperation interface, that is, a process-view, which shares essential progress data to support cooperation but conceals internal process structures to preserve autonomy. In addition to monitoring and controlling the progress of partners' workflows via their process-views, an enterprise can obtain personalized supply chain data from its integrated process. Moreover, enterprises interact through virtual states of process-views that conform to interoperation standards. Therefore, distributed, heterogeneous and autonomous WfMSs can be integrated in an open environment. The proposed approach mitigates the shortcomings of inter-enterprise workflow collaboration. Our future work will address three themes. First, an enterprise must verify the correctness of B2B workflows before enforcing cooperation. An integrated process provides a proving ground for B2B workflow integration. Future enhancement will support tools for verifying integrated process definitions. Second, handling the four WfMC interoperation models by using process-views will be investigated. Finally, exceptions (for example, suspension of production due to an earthquake) always occur in commercial markets, so that B2B workflows do not always operate as expected. Some studies have proposed advanced workflow models to manage exceptions in WfMSs, including [4] and [11]. The process-view model should incorporate exception-handling mechanisms to establish a robust collaboration environment.