Intelligence in Business Processes
The question how to add more intelligence to Business Processes provokes me to share a my opinion on this.
Yes, of course we can discuss about business rules and automated decisions. But in the end, the most intelligent entity on earth is still the user. Yes, we can discuss about AI and Deep Blue being Chess Champion. But my statement still holds.
Yes, it is all about decisions. But that does not imply, that the decisions need to be automated. Some can. But often the business process should push the necessary decision to the user.
And to allow for intelligent decisions, it is crucial to allow for enough decision alternatives. This may sound simplistic in the beginning. But it is not. Bare with me for a moment.
So what is as simple as an approval? Approve or Reject. The simplest decision in the world. But not so simple. Of course, if only Approve or Reject is modeled / implemented, then what should the user do, if he wants to do something else? What else could a user do other than Approve or Reject? He might want to send it back to revision for example. Another user might want to change the underlying approval object – what influence does this have on the process? A realignment of the process is necessary. What, if an approver wants to merge several approvals into one or if he wants to split one into several. Partly Approve. Partly Reject. Partly Edit. Define new Followup – Approval. Change the Approval Type. Merge unterlying objects. Split them. And Realing the Process. Or substitute the Business Process by an equivalent different one. If you only begin to think about it, then you can hardly stop. And if you think, what that means for a process model, then I would say this is a real challenge. Certainly far more than giving only two branches: Approve and Reject.
So in my opinion adding intelligence to business process means also adding flexibility to the business process, that allows for more than simple alternatives for the user and to push decisions to the user. And to allow for automated decisions to be overruled by the user in many cases.
