Process cards could be used for off-line modeling of processes in workshops:
Number of participants: 3-7 (best case, could be more or less, but than it may becomes inefficient)
Duration of modeling workshop: 3-6 h (best case, shorter meetings are to short for walk through, longer meetings are too hard for concentration)
Rules for modeling with process cards:
- Use for every task, event, gateway or object a own single card.
- Tasks are described with verb + object (e.g. approve request, unload truck, calculate price)
- Events are described “passive” in simple past (e.g. message received, request send, truck arrived) or with conditions (e.g. stock < 10.000 pcs) or with time expresions (e.g. 8.00, after 2 h, Monday morning). There are start, end and intermediate events.
- Objects are used for documents, digital information, physical things and so on (e.g. Request form, database table, a pizza)
Modeling procedure:
- Define start and end event for processes with all participants
- Workshop participants have 15 minutes to write down activities, gateways, objects and intermediate events. If there are more than one process and the group is big enough split into smaller groups and every group write down one process.
- Walk through every process with all participants. Per process one participant has to explain every single task in detail (What is done there, how is the work done, which objects are used, which conditions are relevant, etc.) All others ask questions and together the participants could immediately add new tasks, gateways, events and objects to enrich the process, but continue and focus on getting the walk through completed.
- Repeat step 3 until no more details are required.
Task:
Gateway:
Event:
Object:
You are interested into the template of the process cards (available as PDF) or you would like to have a small set of process cards for testing purposes. Please contact me: info@bpm-guerilla.com
