Business Process Modeling Elements

Business process models chart the relationships between four basic modeling elements: processes, external entities, stores, and data flows. Additionally, qualifiers, resources, and data structures further define the relationships between these elements

Process: A task or decision to be carried out by an application or organization. Processes are expressed in terms of actions that are accomplished using resources. Examples of processes include hiring new employees, billing, tracking customer complaints, and so forth.

External entity: A person, organizational entity, or other object that is outside the business unit or application being described but interacts with it. External entities are either a source or destination of information in the system being modeled. Examples of external entities include customers, tenants, Congress, marketing, and so on.

Store: Data that is created, utilized, or changed by the system being modeled. Examples of stores include customer records, charts of accounts, account masters, property files, and so forth.

Flow: Goods or data moving between external entities, processes, and stores. Examples of flows include customer information, order shipment, express mail delivery, service request, and so forth.

Resource: An element of the system being modeled that is utilized in some way by a process. Examples of resources include a database server, a tape drive, a personnel manager, office supplies, and so on.

Qualifier: Further defines an external entity, flow, process, or store. For example, a qualifier may indicate that service requests are usually taken by phone or that employee hire information is sent to the home office via e-mail.

Data structure: Detailed information about the data contained in a store. Data structures enumerate the attributes of a store’s contents.

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