Abstract
Although Business process modelling is an increasingly popular research area for both organisations and enterprises due to its usefulness in optimizing resources management, business reengineering and business performance, it is not yet widely accepted in Small and Medium size Enterprises (SMEs), which are vital for sustainable economy development. The understanding of Business Process is an essential approach for an Organization to achieve set objectives and improve its operations. It has been able to show Business Analysts, and Managers where bottleneck exists in the system, how to optimize the Business Process to reduce cost of running the Organization, and the required resources needed for an Organization. This is clear for large scale organizations and enterprises but under research investigation for SMEs. Business Process Modelling (BPM) is a representation of the processes of the Organization. Several modelling techniques have been proposed and used to capture the characteristics of business processes. However, limited guidelines exist for selecting appropriate modelling techniques based on the characteristics of the problem and its requirements. This is even more accurate in the case of selecting proper BPM software tools to achieve those BPM modelling and simulation goals. This paper aims at presenting a comparative analysis of some relatively popular business process modelling techniques focusing on the associated software tools. The comparative framework proposed is based on the following major criteria: data flow capability, logical reasoning and understandability, specification of roles, and capability of simulation, flexibility and ease of use, simulation support and scope. However, the emphasis of this investigation is put on SME applicability of these tools and techniques. Therefore, the first goal is to define proper selection criteria for the application of BPM tools to SMEs. The proposed framework can serve as the basis for evaluating further modelling techniques and generating selection procedures focusing on a comparison of existing tools to implement these techniques properly for SMEs. This is to enable a potential user/modeller choose the right technique and tool in modelling critical SME Business Processes in order to analyse and optimize its operations.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.
Buying options
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Learn about institutional subscriptionsReferences
Aguilar-Saven, R.S.: Business process modelling: review and framework. Int. J. Prod. Econ. 90, 129–149 (2003)
Al-Mudimigh, A.S.: The role and impact of business process management in enterprise systems implementation. Bus. Process Manag. J. 13(6), 866–874 (2007)
Bazhenova, E., Taratukhin, V., Becker, J.: Towards on business process management on small-to medium enterprises in the emerging economies.In: 7th International Forum on Strategic Strategic Technology (IFOST), pp. 1–5 (2012)
Bridgeland, D.M., Zahavi, R.: Business Modelling - A Practical Guide to Realizing Business Value. Morgan Kaufmann, Burlington (2009)
Business Process Modelling (2007). From Business Process Modelling, http://www.businessprocessmodelling.co.uk. Accessed 21 June 2014
Business Process Modelling (2013). From BusinessBalls.com, http://www.businessballs.com/business-process-modelling.htm. Accessed 24 June 2014
Chong, S.: Business process management for SMEs: an exploratory study of implementation factors for the Australian wine industry.J. Inf. Syst. Small Bus. 1(1–2), 41–58 (2007)
De Bruin, T., Rosemann, M.: Towards a business process management maturity model. In: Proceedings of the 13th European Conference on Information Systems, CD Rom, Paper presented at the ECIS 2005 (2005)
Fogarty, G., Armstrong, D.B.: Modelling the interactions among factors that influence successful computerisation of small business.Australas. J. Inf. Syst. 15(2) (2009)
Harmon, P.: The scope and evolution of business process management. In: vom Brocke, J., Rosemann, M. (Eds.) Handbook on Business Process Management 1. International Handbooks on Information Systems, pp. 37–81, Springer, Heidelberg (2010). doi:10.1007/978-3-642-00416-2_3
Imanipour, N., Talebi, K., Rezazadeh, S.: Business process management (BPM) implementation and adoption in SMEs: inhibiting factors for Iranian e-retail industry. J. Knowl. Process Manag. (2012a)
Imanipour, N., Talebi, K., Rezazadeh, S.: Obstacles in business process management (BPM) implementation and adoption in SMEs (2012b). Available at SSRN. http://ssrn.com/abstract=1990609. Accessed 29 July 2012
Kirchmer, M.: Small and medium enterprises also benefit from MPE. In: Kirchmer, M. (Ed.) High Performance Through Process Excellence, pp. 147–157. Springer, Heidelberg (2011). doi:10.1007/978-3-642-21165-2_10
Kalnins, A., Kalnina, D., Kalis, A. (n.d.): Comparison of Tools and Languages for Business Process Reengineering. http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.127.1036&rep=rep1&type=pdf
Kannengiesser, U.: Evaluation of BPMN Tools. National Information Communications Technology Australia (2007)
Papademetriou, R. Karras, D.A.: An in depth comparative analysis of software tools for modelling and simulating business processes. In: BMSD 2016 - Proceedings of the 6th International Symposium on Business Modeling and Software Design, pp. 124–133 (2016)
Prezel, V., Gašević, D., Milanović, M. (n.d.): Representational Analysis of Business Process and Business Rule Languages. From OntoRule Project, http://ontorule-project.eu/attachments/075_buro2010_paper_2.pdf
Recker, J., Indulska, M., Rosemann, M., Green, P.: Business process modelling - a comparative analysis. J. Assoc. Inf. Syst. 10(4), 333–363 (2009)
Rolóna, E., Chaviraa, G., et al.: Towards a framework for evaluating usability of business process models with BPMN in health sector. In: Procedia Manufacturing, 6th International Conference on Applied Human Factors and Ergonomics (AHFE 2015) and the Affiliated Conferences, AHFE 2015, vol. 3, pp. 5603–5610 (2015). http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.promfg.2015.07.748
Vergidis, K., Tiwari, A., Majeed, B.: Business process analysis and optimization beyond reengineering. IEEE Trans. Syst. Man Cybern. Part C Appl. Rev. 38, 69–82 (2008)
Yamamoto, R., Yamamoto, K., Ohashi, K., Inomata, J.: Development of a business process modeling methodology and a tool for sharing business processes. In: 12th Asia-Pacific Software Engineering Conference (APSEC 2005). IEEE (2005)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2017 Springer International Publishing AG
About this paper
Cite this paper
Papademetriou, R.C., Karras, D.A. (2017). Towards a Thorough Evaluation Framework of Software Tools Suitable for Small and Medium Size Enterprises Focusing on Modelling and Simulating Business Processes. In: Shishkov, B. (eds) Business Modeling and Software Design. BMSD 2016. Lecture Notes in Business Information Processing, vol 275. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-57222-2_8
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-57222-2_8
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-57221-5
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-57222-2
eBook Packages: Business and ManagementBusiness and Management (R0)