Process mining
Encyclopedia
Process mining is a process management
technique that allows for the analysis of business process
es based on event logs. The basic idea is to extract knowledge from event logs recorded by an information system. Process mining aims at improving this by providing techniques and tools for discovering process, control, data, organizational, and social structures from event logs.
system, and the electronic patient records in a hospital can be used to discover models describing processes, organizations, and products. Moreover, such event logs can also be used to compare event logs with some a priori
model to see whether the observed reality conforms to some prescriptive or descriptive model.
Contemporary management trends such as BAM (Business Activity Monitoring
), BOM (Business Operations Management), BPI (Business process intelligence) illustrate the interest in supporting the diagnosis functionality in the context of Business Process Management
technology (e.g., Workflow Management Systems but also other process-aware information systems).
model and, if so, how it is used.
See the book Process Mining: Discovery, Conformance and Enhancement of Business Processes by Wil van der Aalst
for details.
s has been developed at the Eindhoven University of Technology
by Wil van der Aalst
and others, and is available as an open source toolkit.
Process Mining functionality is also offered by the following commercial vendors:
Process management
Process management is the ensemble of activities of planning and monitoring the performance of a process. The term usually refers to the management of business processes and manufacturing processes...
technique that allows for the analysis of business process
Business process
A business process or business method is a collection of related, structured activities or tasks that produce a specific service or product for a particular customer or customers...
es based on event logs. The basic idea is to extract knowledge from event logs recorded by an information system. Process mining aims at improving this by providing techniques and tools for discovering process, control, data, organizational, and social structures from event logs.
Overview
Process mining techniques are often used when no formal description of the process can be obtained by other approaches, or when the quality of an existing documentation is questionable. For example, the audit trails of a workflow management system, the transaction logs of an enterprise resource planningEnterprise resource planning
Enterprise resource planning systems integrate internal and external management information across an entire organization, embracing finance/accounting, manufacturing, sales and service, customer relationship management, etc. ERP systems automate this activity with an integrated software application...
system, and the electronic patient records in a hospital can be used to discover models describing processes, organizations, and products. Moreover, such event logs can also be used to compare event logs with some a priori
A priori (statistics)
In statistics, a priori knowledge is prior knowledge about a population, rather than that estimated by recent observation. It is common in Bayesian inference to make inferences conditional upon this knowledge, and the integration of a priori knowledge is the central difference between the Bayesian...
model to see whether the observed reality conforms to some prescriptive or descriptive model.
Contemporary management trends such as BAM (Business Activity Monitoring
Business activity monitoring
Business activity monitoring is software that aids in monitoring of business activities, as those activities are implemented in computer systems....
), BOM (Business Operations Management), BPI (Business process intelligence) illustrate the interest in supporting the diagnosis functionality in the context of Business Process Management
Business process management
Business process management is a holistic management approach focused on aligning all aspects of an organization with the wants and needs of clients. It promotes business effectiveness and efficiency while striving for innovation, flexibility, and integration with technology. BPM attempts to...
technology (e.g., Workflow Management Systems but also other process-aware information systems).
Classification
There are three classes of process mining techniques. This classification is based on whether there is an a prioriA priori (statistics)
In statistics, a priori knowledge is prior knowledge about a population, rather than that estimated by recent observation. It is common in Bayesian inference to make inferences conditional upon this knowledge, and the integration of a priori knowledge is the central difference between the Bayesian...
model and, if so, how it is used.
- Discovery: There is no a priori model, i.e., based on an event log some model is constructed. For example, using the alpha algorithmAlpha algorithmThe α-algorithm is an algorithm used in process mining, aimed at reconstructing causality from a set of sequences of events.It was first put forward by van der Aalst, Weijter and Măruşter...
a process model can be discovered based on low-level events. There exist many techniques to automatically construct process models (e.g., in terms of a Petri netPetri netA Petri net is one of several mathematical modeling languages for the description of distributed systems. A Petri net is a directed bipartite graph, in which the nodes represent transitions and places...
) based some event log. Recently, process mining research also started to target the other perspectives (e.g., data, resources, time, etc.). For example, the technique described in (Aalst, Reijers, & Song, 2005) can be used to construct a social network.
- Conformance: There is an a priori model. This model is compared with the event log and discrepancies between the log and the model are analyzed. For example, there may be a process model indicating that purchase orders of more than 1 million euro require two checks. Another example is the checking of the so-called “four-eyes” principle. Conformance checking may be used to detect deviations to enrich the model. An example is the extension of a process model with performance data, i.e., some a priori process model is used to project the bottlenecks on. Another example is the decision miner described in (Rozinat & Aalst, 2006b) which takes an a priori process model and analyzes every choice in the process model. For each choice the event log is consulted to see which information is typically available the moment the choice is made. Then classical data mining techniques are used to see which data elements influence the choice. As a result, a decision tree is generated for each choice in the process.
- Extension: There is an a-priori model. This model is extended with a new aspect or perspective, i.e., the goal is not to check conformance but to enrich the model. An example is the extension of a process model with performance data, i.e., some a-priori process model dynamically annotated with performance data (e.g., bottlenecks are shown by coloring parts of the process model).
See the book Process Mining: Discovery, Conformance and Enhancement of Business Processes by Wil van der Aalst
Wil van der Aalst
Wil M.P. van der Aalst is a Dutch computer scientist, and professor at the Department of Mathematics & Computer Science of the Technische Universiteit Eindhoven, where he chairs the Architecture of Information Systems group, His research and teaching interests include information systems, workflow...
for details.
Software for process mining
A software framework for the evaluation of process mining algorithmAlgorithm
In mathematics and computer science, an algorithm is an effective method expressed as a finite list of well-defined instructions for calculating a function. Algorithms are used for calculation, data processing, and automated reasoning...
s has been developed at the Eindhoven University of Technology
Eindhoven University of Technology
The ' is a university of technology located in Eindhoven, Netherlands. The motto of the university is: Mens agitat molem . The university was the second of its kind in the Netherlands, only Delft University of Technology existed previously. Until mid-1980 it was known as the...
by Wil van der Aalst
Wil van der Aalst
Wil M.P. van der Aalst is a Dutch computer scientist, and professor at the Department of Mathematics & Computer Science of the Technische Universiteit Eindhoven, where he chairs the Architecture of Information Systems group, His research and teaching interests include information systems, workflow...
and others, and is available as an open source toolkit.
- Process Mining
- ProM Framework
- ProM Import Framework
Process Mining functionality is also offered by the following commercial vendors:
- Futura Reflect, a Process Mining and Process Intelligence suite developed by Futura Technology
- Interstage Automated Process Discovery, a Process Mining service offered by Fujitsu, Ltd. as part of the Interstage Integration Middleware Suite.
- BPMone, offering both basic process mining functionality as well as a more comprehensive process mining module as part of the Pallas Athena BPMone software suite.
- Nitro is a tool by Fluxicon for easily converting CSVComma-separated valuesA comma-separated values file stores tabular data in plain-text form. As a result, such a file is easily human-readable ....
and XLS event logs for ProM. - ARIS Process Performance Manager, a Process Mining and Process Intelligence Tool offered by Software AG as part of the Process Intelligence Solution.
- QPR ProcessAnalyzer, a tool for Automated Business Process Discovery, and QPR ProcessAnalysis, a service based on the aforementioned, offered by QPR Software Plc
Related links
- Business Process DiscoveryBusiness Process DiscoveryBusiness process discovery related to process mining is a set of techniques that automatically construct a representation of an organization’s current business processes and its major process variations...
- Business Process ManagementBusiness process managementBusiness process management is a holistic management approach focused on aligning all aspects of an organization with the wants and needs of clients. It promotes business effectiveness and efficiency while striving for innovation, flexibility, and integration with technology. BPM attempts to...
- WorkflowWorkflowA workflow consists of a sequence of connected steps. It is a depiction of a sequence of operations, declared as work of a person, a group of persons, an organization of staff, or one or more simple or complex mechanisms. Workflow may be seen as any abstraction of real work...
- Sequence miningSequence miningSequence mining is concerned with finding statistically relevant patterns between data examples where the values are delivered in a sequence. It is usually presumed that the values are discrete, and thus Time series mining is closely related, but usually considered a different activity...
- Data miningData miningData mining , a relatively young and interdisciplinary field of computer science is the process of discovering new patterns from large data sets involving methods at the intersection of artificial intelligence, machine learning, statistics and database systems...
Further reading
- Aalst, W. van derWil van der AalstWil M.P. van der Aalst is a Dutch computer scientist, and professor at the Department of Mathematics & Computer Science of the Technische Universiteit Eindhoven, where he chairs the Architecture of Information Systems group, His research and teaching interests include information systems, workflow...
(2011). Process Mining: Discovery, Conformance and Enhancement of Business Processes. Springer Verlag, Berlin (ISBN 978-3-642-19344-6). - Aalst, W. van derWil van der AalstWil M.P. van der Aalst is a Dutch computer scientist, and professor at the Department of Mathematics & Computer Science of the Technische Universiteit Eindhoven, where he chairs the Architecture of Information Systems group, His research and teaching interests include information systems, workflow...
, Dongen, B. van, Herbst, J., Maruster, L., Schimm, G., & Weijters, A. (2003). Workflow Mining: A Survey of Issues and Approaches. Data and Knowledge Engineering, 47 (2), 237–267. - Aalst, W. van derWil van der AalstWil M.P. van der Aalst is a Dutch computer scientist, and professor at the Department of Mathematics & Computer Science of the Technische Universiteit Eindhoven, where he chairs the Architecture of Information Systems group, His research and teaching interests include information systems, workflow...
, Reijers, H., & Song, M. (2005). Discovering Social Networks from Event Logs. Computer Supported Cooperative work, 14 (6), 549–593. - Jans, M., van der Werf, J.M., Lybaert, N., Vanhoof, K. (2011) A business process mining application for internal transaction fraud mitigation, Expert Systems with Applications, 38 (10), 13351-13359
- Dongen, B. van, Medeiros, A., Verbeek, H., Weijters, A., & Aalst, W. van derWil van der AalstWil M.P. van der Aalst is a Dutch computer scientist, and professor at the Department of Mathematics & Computer Science of the Technische Universiteit Eindhoven, where he chairs the Architecture of Information Systems group, His research and teaching interests include information systems, workflow...
(2005). The ProM framework: A New Era in Process Mining Tool Support. In G. Ciardo & P. Darondeau (Eds.), Application and Theory of Petri Nets 2005 (Vol. 3536, pp. 444–454). Springer-Verlag, Berlin. - Dumas, M., Aalst, W. van derWil van der AalstWil M.P. van der Aalst is a Dutch computer scientist, and professor at the Department of Mathematics & Computer Science of the Technische Universiteit Eindhoven, where he chairs the Architecture of Information Systems group, His research and teaching interests include information systems, workflow...
, & Hofstede, A. ter (2005). Process-Aware Information Systems: Bridging People and Software through Process Technology. Wiley & Sons. - Grigori, D., Casati, F., Castellanos, M., Dayal, U., Sayal, M., & Shan, M. (2004). Business Process Intelligence. Computers in Industry, 53 (3), 321–343.
- Grigori, D., Casati, F., Dayal, U., & Shan, M. (2001). Improving Business Process Quality through Exception Understanding, Prediction, and Prevention. In P. Apers, P. Atzeni, S. Ceri, S. Paraboschi, K. Ramamohanarao, & R. Snodgrass (Eds.), Proceedings of 27th international conference on Very Large Data Bases (VLDB’01) (pp. 159–168). Morgan Kaufmann.
- IDS Scheer. (2002). ARIS Process Performance Manager (ARIS PPM): Measure, Analyze and Optimize Your Business Process Performance (whitepaper).
- Ingvaldsen, J.E., & J.A. Gulla. (2006). Model Based Business Process Mining. Journal of Information Systems Management, Vol. 23, No. 1, Special Issue on Business Intelligence, Auerbach Publications
- zur Muehlen, M. (2004). Workflow-based Process Controlling: Foundation, Design and Application of workflow-driven Process Information Systems. Logos, Berlin.
- zur Muehlen, M., & Rosemann, M. (2000). Workflow-based Process Monitoring and Controlling - Technical and Organizational Issues. In R. Sprague (Ed.), Proceedings of the 33rd Hawaii international conference on system science (HICSS-33) (pp. 1–10). IEEE Computer Society Press, Los Alamitos, California.
- Rozinat, A., & Aalst, W. van derWil van der AalstWil M.P. van der Aalst is a Dutch computer scientist, and professor at the Department of Mathematics & Computer Science of the Technische Universiteit Eindhoven, where he chairs the Architecture of Information Systems group, His research and teaching interests include information systems, workflow...
(2006b). Decision Mining in ProM. In S. Dustdar, J. Faideiro, & A. Sheth (Eds.), International Conference on Business Process Management (BPM 2006) (Vol. 4102, pp. 420–425). Springer-Verlag, Berlin. - Sayal, M., Casati, F., Dayal, U., & Shan, M. (2002). Business Process Cockpit. In Proceedings of 28th international conference on very large data bases (VLDB’02) (pp. 880–883). Morgan Kaufmann.
- Huser V, Starren JB, EHR Data Pre-processing Facilitating Process Mining: an Application to Chronic Kidney Disease. AMIA Annu Symp Proc 2009 link
External links
- Process mining research at Eindhoven University of Technology.