Overview

When undertaking analysis, the question business and systems analysts are trying to answer is what should the system do? The analysis phase of a project starts with an information capture stage in which we perform interviews, questionnaires and observation in order to understand the existing situation. A definition stage follows in which the information gathered is summarized in a specification. The requirements specification produced acts as an input to the next stage where system analysts design how the system will physically function.

In doing analysis for workflow systems we are aiming to specify the way business processes should work. This includes specifying the pieces of work staff need to complete and the order in which they need to occur. Whether specific roles such as "supervisor" are needed for some tasks and the roles of the people and other resources needed to perform them are also described.

There is no magic formula, or set of steps for performing workflow analysis. It is made more difficult since there are a range of process definition methods which exist from individual vendors and those promoted by industry groups such as the WfMC. These will be described and examples will illustrate how the most important methods can be used. You will then be able to select from a range of techniques as you see fit..

In This Chapter

This chapter shows how to specify what you want from your groupware or workflow system. That is, it defines how to specify the detailed...