Collaborative Modeling Using UML and Business Process Simulation

Business process (BP) change projects often involve the redesign of organizational information systems (IS). To successfully align the design of processes and IS, collaboration between BP and IS analysts is required. This is usually done with the aid of IS and BP models. This paper argues that such models often fail to address the concerns and information needs of both groups because they are not created in a collaborative way. Thus, it proposes a modeling framework that maps the constructs used in IS models to those used in BP models so that both groups consider their organizational views in their designs. The framework was applied in a business process change project for a multinational pharmaceuticals organization. The results of this case study indicated that: a) sharing the information between BP and IS models contributed to foster collaboration between analysts in both domains; and b) aiding the collaboration between analysts produced more integrated solutions.