The management of process-oriented organizations requires appropriate measurements in order to verify and ensure the effectiveness of the organizational processes. Process controlling has the goal of ensuring the rationality of the decision making process through the supply of relevant information about the process execution. Workflow management systems record events occurring during the execution of process instances and are thus capable of providing detailed information about the performance of operative processes. While some research has been conducted on the analysis of stand-alone workflow applications, the monitoring of distributed processes, especially in cross organizational workflows using web services, such as supply chain scenarios, has received significantly less attention. The AMoCoS project aims at the analysis of this type of application.

For this purpose we design and develop the prototype of a monitoring and controlling agent that is capable of registering itself to an internal or cross-organizational workflow, record the events that occur during the enactment of workflow instances and report back to the user with information that matches the user’s information requirements profile.

Research Type

Design Science/Prototype Research

Investigators

• Michael zur Muehlen (Stevens Institute of Technology)
• Xiangyu Lai (Stevens Institute of Technology)
• Wasim Sadiq (SAP Research)
• Karsten Schulz (SAP Research)

Funding Agency

SAP Research

Budget

$ 157,000 over 18 Months

Duration

2004-2006