Process

In the field of BPM, a Process is a group or a series of "Tasks as units of the business processing."

What is a Process? (Overview of a Process)
A Process signifies a procedure or a route, and is used widely in a number of fields; for instance "Business Process" in management engineering, or "Software Development Process" in software engineering. In activities of Business Process Management (BPM), a Process (Business Process) is treated as a collection of "Tasks as units of the business processing." Also, in many cases, it is used with the meaning of multiple Task group which procedure is fixed by looking into the order.

In BPMN, a process is defined as one form of activities (business executed in companies and organizations). That is, an "atomic activity" (*) is called a task, and a "non-atomic activity" (compound activity) is called a process or a Sub-Process.

(*)Unit of business process that cannot be divided any more

Definition of a Process
Although various techniques are possible for defining a process, the components are often conceptually demonstrated by 3 items below. The description of a process is called a Process Model. In Business Process Management (BPM) activities, management of Process Models may be the most important theme.
 * Flow Model: what type of tasks, what type of procedures, when executed
 * Organization Model: who executes each task?
 * Data Model: what is input/output of each task?

Types of Processes
It is possible to classify according to concrete types of business, to forms of Process Diagrams, to structures of Data Models.

Workflow Pattern exists as a method to sort according to partial or entire process diagram, while "Process Classification Framework (PCF)" of APQC exists as a framework to classify based on concrete types of business.


 * 1) Vision/Process to settle strategy
 * 2) Product/Process to design or develop service
 * 3) Product/Process to sell service
 * 4) Product/Process to deliver service
 * 5) Process to manage customer service
 * 6) Process to develop or manage human capital
 * 7) Process to manage information technology
 * 8) Process to manage financial resource
 * 9) Process to obtain, construct, manage fixed assets
 * 10) Process to manage environmental safety hygiene
 * 11) Process to manage relation to the outside
 * 12) Process to manage knowledge, improvement, change

Processes in a Wide Sense
When saying simply a process, various examples can be considered. An effort is often necessary to explicitly specify the meaning.


 * "Steps of business (including "flow")" (see "Process Model")
 * "It is necessary to drastically review the process, and to increase effectiveness of business."


 * "Flow of business" (see "Process Diagram")


 * "I want to examine concurrent processing making around processes with no split."


 * "Matter to deal with business" (see "Process Diagram")


 * "Let's annul the process that stagnates." "It is necessary to always observe the process."

Related Articles

 * Process Model
 * Process Diagram
 * BPM
 * Process Owner
 * Task
 * Activity
 * Deadlock
 * Internal Control Reporting System
 * APQC
 * Workflow Pattern
 * Operations Research
 * Intalio
 * EAI
 * Participant
 * BPEL
 * ABC analysis (Activity Based Costing)
 * BPR
 * Work-sharing