This talk introduces the concept of Augmented Business Process Management System: An ABPMS is a process-aware information system that relies on trustworthy AI technology to
reason and act upon data, within a set of restrictions, with the aim to continuously adapt and
improve a set of business processes with respect to one or more key performance indicators.
The talk describes the transition from existing process mining technology to AI-Augmented BPM as a pyramid, where predictive, prescriptive, conversational and reasoning capabilities are stacked up incrementally to reach the level of Augmented BPM.
Talk delivered at the AAAI'2023 Workshop on AI for Business Process Management.
11. Given
• one or more event logs recording the execution
of one or more processes
• one or more performance measures that we
seek to maximize/minimize
• a process model, decision rules and resource
allocation rules
• a set of allowed changes to the process model
and associated rules
Find
• Possible sets of changes to the process to
optimize the performance measures
18. Augmented BPM System
An ABPMS is a process-aware
information system that relies on
trustworthy AI technology to reason and
act upon data, within a set of restrictions,
with the aim to continuously adapt and
improve a set of business processes with
respect to one or more performance
indicators.
AI-Augmented Business Process Management Systems:
A Research Manifesto
9
19. Properties of an ABPMS
• Acts independently and proactively within a frame;
Framed-Autonomous
• Seamlessly interacts with agents whenever necessary
Conversationally Sctionable
• Reacts to changes in its environment
Adaptive
• Observes the effect of its actions and adjusts future actions to seek
optimal achievement of its goals
Self-improving
• Able to explain its actions to human agents.
Explainable
22. AI-Augmented BPM: Why now?
Timing could not be any better:
• Process mining is a mature capability yet a rapidly growing market
• ML has matured and proved value in the B2C space, but is yet to take off in
the process optimization space
• Thousand of orgs have already reached Level 1 in the pyramid, ready to
adopt Level 2+
23. • Lay the foundations, start climbing, keep climbing, don't hold off
Getting the data for process mining is often a challenge.
But there are both short-term benefits (bottom of the pyramid) and long-term ones
(predictive, prescriptive, conversational process optimization)
• Don't skip the layers
The lower layers of the pyramid provide a foundation to derive business value from the upper
layers.
• Align strategically and build governance incrementally
Apply the capabilities in the pyramid first and foremost to business processes that matter to
the organization.
Adopt these capabilities incrementally, one process at a time.
Build success stories internally, ensuring each layer of the pyramid produces tangible value.
V. Leno, A. Polyvyanyy, M. La Rosa, M. Dumas and F. Maria Maggi. Action logger: Enabling process mining for robotic process automation. In Proceedings of the Dissertation Award, Doctoral Consortium, and Demonstration Track at BPM 2019, 124–128, 2019
Available recording tools (e.g., WinParrot, JitBit) record low-level action only – clickstreams, keystrokes
Although RPA tools (e.g., UI Path, Automation Anywhere) provide recording capabilities they are focused on manual programming of scripts. They do not record values of involved fields, do not capture timestamps, etc.
In UI Path Studio, however, there is a component called UI Explorer, that is similar to our Action Logger, but it works only for Web (supports limited amount of actions), while our tool covers also Excel spreadsheet
Lay the foundations, start climbing, keep climbing, don't hold off. Many managers postpone the adoption of process mining by stating “we don’t have the data”, or “our data is not good enough”. Yes, getting the data for process mining is often a challenge. But the benefits have been demonstrated repeatedly, in thousands of successful deployments. And getting the data to do process mining opens many doors. The data that is used today for process mining can be used tomorrow for predictive process monitoring or to build digital process twins. Once the obstacle of data collection and curation has been overcome, the possibilities are endless. Note that task mining provides an additional channel for collecting data— when the enterprise system does not allow us to do so.
Don't skip the layers. The lower layers of the Augmented BPM pyramid provide a foundation to derive business value from the upper layers. Organizations that wish to maximize the benefits of adopting the upper-layer capabilities need to master the lower layers.
Align strategically and build governance incrementally. Any process mining, predictive monitoring, or prescriptive process improvement initiative needs to be grounded on the strategic priorities of the organization. The capabilities in the augmented BPM pyramid should first and foremost be applied to business processes that matter to the organization. It is also important to adopt these technologies incrementally, one process at a time. Over time, a governance structure is needed to ensure that the technologies in the pyramid create value predictably and repeatably. But before getting there, it is important to have a few success stories internally, to gain executive support, and to keep this support by showing that every capability in the augmented BPM pyramid produces tangible value.