Business process simulation in the context of enterprise engineering

Abstract

Traditional business process-based discrete event simulation is not sufficiently powerful to support change-related business process reengineering (BPR). The simulation methods are inadequate for describing large, complex systems and are difficult to change so as to simulate new BPR designs. The limitations are caused by (1) focusing on workflow; (2) low-abstraction conceptual models; and (3) a lack of separate opinions on design and implementation. Our research is based on enterprise engineering, a construction-based approach, rather than workflow. By clarifying the differences between and dependencies of the ontological and implementation models, this research proposes a generic framework for generating a modularized and component-based simulation model with increased reusability as well as with the capacity to make controllable changes in enterprise simulation. The method is assumed to assist BPR by reducing complexity and through its focus on enterprise engineering-based design thinking and human-centered interactions.