A Comparative Analysis of Business Process Modelling Techniques

Proceedings of the U.K. Academy for Information Systems (UKAIS 2009), 14th Annual Conference 1 A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF BUSINESS PROCESS MODELLING TECHNIQUES Laden Aldin and Sergio de Cesare Department of Information Systems and Computing Brunel University Uxbridge, U.K. Email: {laden.aldin|sergio.decesare}@brunel.ac.uk Abstract Business process modelling is an increasingly popular research area for both organisations and academia due to its usefulness in facilitating human understanding and communication. Several modelling techniques have been proposed and used to capture the characteristics of business processes. However, available techniques view business processes from different perspectives and have different features and capabilities. Furthermore, to date limited guidelines exist for selecting appropriate modelling techniques based on the characteristics of the problem and its requirements. This paper presents a comparative analysis of some popular business process modelling techniques. The comparative framework is based on five criteria: flexibility, ease of use, understandability, simulation support and scope. The study highlights some of the major paradigmatic differences between the techniques. The proposed framework can serve as the basis for evaluating further modelling techniques and generating selection procedures.