Design and management of flexible process variants using templates and rules

This paper makes four main contributions towards managing large collections of process models. First, we show how flexible process variants can be configured by applying rules to a generic process template using a configuration algorithm. This leads to a separation of control flow and business policy. Second, we develop a new succinct representation for process trees as strings by performing a post-order traversal. This structure can facilitate process variant configuration and retrieval. Third, we develop techniques for querying a repository of process variants by means of bit vectors. In this way the management of variants even in a large repository is greatly enhanced. Finally, we describe a preliminary implementation of our approach with a case study for demonstration. Our focus is on capturing deeper process knowledge and achieving a holistic approach to robust process design, as well as ease of accommodating changes to business policy.