bruce on February 3rd, 2010

Today Robert Shapiro of XPDL 2.x fame, also a member of the BPMN 2.0 Finalization Task Force in OMG, delivered an update on progress toward completing both XPDL 2.2 and BPMN 2.0.  Here is the link to the unedited replay.  Also, Sandy Kemsley does her usual fine job of summarizing the high points here.
I would [...]

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bruce on January 13th, 2010

Thanks to all of you who took my BPMN Self-Test.  BPMN, today accepted as the universal process modeling standard, is outwardly familiar — it looks like traditional swimlane flowcharts — but few people really know how to use it effectively. That’s what I try to teach in my book and the BPMessentials training. The self-test [...]

Continue reading about Self-Test Answers and Explanation

bruce on January 11th, 2010

This morning Progress Software announced the acquisition of Savvion for $49 Million.  On the heels of last month’s acquisition of Lombardi by IBM, I think it’s safe to say this marks a real turning point in the market for BPMS.  To me it is a disquieting one, as it suggests the failure of BPM’s “business empowerment” [...]

Continue reading about The Beginning of the End in BPM?

bruce on January 7th, 2010

There has been a good response to the BPMN self-test.  The scores have been lower than I expected, but I have gotten nice feedback from the answer sheet and expanations I send out afterward.  It’s fair to say that while the diagram patterns in question describe common business scenarios, they probably represent the part of [...]

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bruce on January 5th, 2010

[This post describes an approach to integrating the Decsion model of von Halle and Goldberg with process modeling in BPMN.  For Part 1, click here.]
Before describing the integration of decision modeling with BPMN, I need to summarize the Decision Model approach described by Barb von Halle and Larry Goldberg in their excellent book.  I can’t [...]

Continue reading about Integrating Process and Rules – Part 2

bruce on January 4th, 2010

I am a little surprised at the scores on my BPMN self-test.  Ten questions, four diagrams each, one of which is the correct answer.  The scenarios are typical from real-world processes, and most of the patterns should be used routinely in process models.  A couple of questions are a little hard, but I would have [...]

Continue reading about Surprising Results on BPMN Self-Test

bruce on December 29th, 2009

I saw a link a couple days ago for a BPMN self-test, and thought I’d try it out.  The test, available to anyone, is “part of a research project by Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin and Technische Universiteit Eindhoven on the understanding of BPMN Process Models.”  It’s harmless I suppose, but – to my way of thinking, [...]

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bruce on December 16th, 2009

IBM left a voicemail at 4:58am today about a 6am briefing to announce the acquisition of Lombardi.  Thanks for the heads up, guys!  Sandy Kemsley does her usual great job with the briefing play-by-play, which I would describe as predictably unrevealing, except for the fact that Lombardi will be brought into WebSphere/AIM instead of being [...]

Continue reading about IBM Buys Lombardi (it was bound to happen…)

bruce on December 16th, 2009

No other topic in the BPM arena has suffered from more misinformation, disinformation, and willful ignorance as the relationship between business process and business rules.  These two disciplines are most often put forward as alternative approaches, rather than complementary aspects of managing the business.  In reality, business process management (BPM) and business decision management (BDM) [...]

Continue reading about Integrating Process and Rules – Part 1

bruce on December 11th, 2009

A reader asked me to comment on an interesting paper by the European BPM academics Mendling, Reijers, and van der Aalst entitled Seven Process Modeling Guidelines (7PMG).  Like my book BPMN Method and Style, 7PMG is asking the right question: what are the principles of style that improve a model’s chance “(1) to become comprehensible to [...]

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