Business Process Analysis

NEEDS ANALYSIS Business Change Identification

10.14.2021
 "The simple believes everything, but the
prudent gives thought to his steps.”

PROVERBS 14:15
BUSINESS PROCESS
ANALYSIS
Business process analysis provides a view of an
organization that is focused on the customer.
 Business event analysis
 Business process modeling
 Business rules analysis
 Decision tables and decision trees
Business events are occurrences to which an organization
needs to respond.

Business event analysis provides a means of breaking down

the work of an organization or business area into discrete

BUSINESS
areas.

EVENT
the occurrences that take place
External events outside the organization or business
area

Internal events the occurrences that take place inside

ANALYSIS
the organization or business area

the regular occurrences that take

Time-based events place at predefined times
EXAMPLES
OF BUSINESS
EVENTS
Whether we are dealing with
business or system events, there is
one constant principle: when an
event occurs it requires a response,
and that response can be analyzed to
consider whether it is adequate and
supports the business objectives.
The response is what the
organization does when it encounters
an event; this response may be
automated, manual or a combination
of both automation and manual
action.
Business process modelling is often
used to carry out the detailed analysis
once the events have been identified.
 Business process models show several of the key
elements of a business process:
 the business event that initiates the process;
 the tasks that make up the process (these are the
pieces of work that are carried out by an actor at
a point in time, and are sometimes called
BUSINESS ‘activities’ – we prefer ‘tasks’ in order to avoid
confusion with the activities on a Business

PROCESS
Activity Model);
 the actors that carry out the tasks or activities
(these actors may, in automated or semi-
MODELING automated processes – for example, workflow
systems – include IT systems);
 the sequence or flow of the tasks;
 the decisions that lead to alternative process
flows;
 the endpoint or outcome of the process;
 optionally, the timeline for the process.
BUSINESS PROCESS
NOTATION SET
PURPOSE OF BUSINESS
PROCESS MODELS
to document an existing process for accreditation purposes;
to use as a basis for training members of staff;
to understand how the process works and where the problems lie;
to provide a basis for business process improvement;
to identify who is involved in the entire process;
to show the sequence of process flow and the alternative flows.
DOCUMENTING
THE TASKS
Consider the following areas to
document the tasks:
 the event that initiates the task;
 the actor who is responsible for the
work;
 the information required to carry out
the task;
 the possible outputs from the task;
 the timing and quality performance
measures that the actor must adhere to
when carrying out this work.
RATIONALIZING
THE PROCESS
MODEL
Business process models are
often produced in such detail
that they show all the individual
tasks, plus the details of each
task.
PROCESS PERFORMANCE
MEASURES
This focus provides a basis for considering the measures to be applied to the actors’
performance.
The performance measures related to the process need to be defined such that they
contribute to meeting the customer’s required value proposition.
For example, if a purchase must be registered, organized and delivered within three
days, each element of the process needs to be set a timescale so that, when taken
collectively, the total time corresponds to this figure. If the delivery task will take
two days, then this might mean that the overall timescale cannot be met.
DEFINING PERFORMANCE
MEASURE
Identify the customer’s requirements, for example as encapsulated in
the value proposition.
Define the performance measures to be achieved by the entire
process.
Analyze each task to set the individual performance measures.
Ensure that the task performance measures will collectively meet the
overall business process performance measures.
BUSINESS RULES ANALYSIS
(CONSTRAINTS ANALYSIS)
Business rules support the way an organization carries out its work.
They are the basis for the decisions that are made, which in turn
determine the information that is distributed and the sequence of
tasks.
Business rules apply at several different levels and can originate
from external and internal sources. The major categories of business
rule are:
 legal and regulatory constraints;
 organizational policy constraints;
 operational procedures.
 Legal and regulatory business rules originate from external
sources.

BUSINESS • These constraints impose decisions on all parts of an organization; areas

affected include accounting and payment procedures, health and safety
requirements and employment rights.

RULE Organizational policy constraints are defined internally and

impose rules upon the organization.
CATEGOR • These policies may relate to areas such as: payments, cancellations and

IES
refunds; appeals and complaints; pricing and discounts.
Operational procedures are also defined internally and are the
business rules that are most likely to be open to challenge and
amendment when pursuing organizational improvement.
• Typical operational procedures include rules for determining customer
discounts or benefits, or for accepting orders or bookings.
UNCOVERING BUSINESS
RULES
When modelling processes or analyzing tasks we can uncover the
business rules by asking about:
the reason for deciding upon a particular course of action;
why the work is carried out in a particular sequence;
the transitions between tasks or the steps within a task (are there any
circumstances under which these transitions would not take place, or
there would be an alternative task invoked)?
For example, we could have a process
that contained the following sequence of
tasks:
record ticket booking;
issue tickets.
Why are there two separate tasks?
The tickets could be available as an email download, and
hence be issued with the booking confirmation during
‘record ticket booking’.
The customer might not be eligible to attend – possibly on
age grounds – and so the booking would have to be
rejected.

EXAMPLE
A decision table shows a set of conditions that Decision tables provide a clear and
may be combined in different ways in order to unambiguous means of documenting
determine the required courses of action. conditions and the resultant actions to be
taken.

DECISION TABLES
ILLUSTRATION All passengers travelling after 10 am
are allowed to purchase off-peak
tickets; tickets for travel before 10 am
are charged at the full price. All
passengers aged 60 and over are
allowed a further 20% discount on the
ticket price charged.
We have two conditions here:
 Is the time of travel after 10 am?
 Is the passenger aged 60 or over?

There are four possible prices

charged:
 full price;
 full price less 20% discount;
 off-peak price;
 off-peak price less 20% discount.
ILLUSTRATION
The most frequently used type of decision table
is known as a limited-entry decision table. In this
table the conditions are expressed as questions
that have a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer. Each
combination of answers to the conditions results
in a specified action; there is an action for each
possible combination.
We can show the rail fare example given above
as a decision table. First, we list the conditions,
as in Table 4.3.
ILLUSTRATION Next, we work out the number
of possible combinations of
conditions. This can be
calculated by using the formula
(2c) where c is the number of
conditions – two, in this
example. This formula ensures
that all the table entries have
been expressed.
In this example, the existence of
two conditions generates 22
combinations of conditions –
four combinations in total. The
easiest way to identify all
possible combinations is to use
the following approach:
This approach always provides the correct
number of condition combinations.
Where there are three conditions, we would
expect to see 23, i.e., eight, combinations of
conditions. This would result in the entries
shown in Table 4.6.

ILLUSTRATION
 ILLUSTRATION
Once the condition entries have
been made, the next step is to
identify all possible actions and
record them in the action stub. It is
helpful if the entries are in the
sequence in which they are to be
applied. For our example, the
actions are listed in Table 4.7.
The action entries for the
combination of conditions are now
indicated in the decision table. The
complete decision table for our
example is shown as Table 4.8.
ILLUSTRAT
ION
A more complex decision table
using the case where there are
three conditions is given as
Table 4.9. As discussed above,
where there are three conditions
the number of combinations is
calculated by using the formula
23, resulting in eight
combinations.
NEXT WEEK:

Decision Trees Business Change

Identification
In advance, please read pp. 116 - 117 In advance, please read pp. 118 - 121