A multi-level framework approach to improve organisational business process understanding within automotive manufacturing

Abstract

Business processes are an integral part of today’s multinational corporations, allowing them to create best practice working models. Not only do business processes play an important role in defining working practices, they can also provide a basis for understanding and improvement. One key difficulty is to capture multiple aspects of a process. Capturing these allows an organisation to use these models for multiple purposes, such as learning while obtaining a high process maturity. There is not a single modelling technique that spans over multiple purposes. This research provides a critical overview of the literature of business process modelling to propose a multi-level framework (MLF). This framework aims to model a single crossfunctional process using multiple modelling techniques to address different organisational purposes and achieve a higher process maturity. Three modelling techniques were identified as appropriate to form part of such a framework: Rich Picture Diagrams (RPD), Business Process Modelling Notation (BPMN) and 4D ontologies. Design Science Research was used in three iterations to build the levels of the multi-level framework in an iterative and incremental design approach. The first two iterations used semistructured interviews to gather data, involve stakeholders and evaluate the models, whilst the third iteration proposes a method to develop and evaluate 4D ontologies. The created artefacts form the process overview (using RPD), application view (using BPMN) and semantic view (4D) levels for the final MLF of a cross-functional process. It addresses organisational purposes such as learning, process development and IT requirements, and covers maturity levels from process creation to optimisation. Involvement of stakeholders in the development and evaluation revealed high satisfaction with the provided views and increased their understanding of the process. Future work would further evaluate the overall framework and study the effects of full implementation within industry.