How Business Process Models and Business Rules Relate … What State Are You In?
Business Process Models: A completed transform often achieves a business milestone and a new state for some operational business thing(s). Example: claimant notified. Fact Models: In fact models (structured business vocabularies) such states are represented by fact types, for example, claimant is notified (or claimant has been notified if you prefer). A fact model literally represents what things the business can know (remember) about completed transforms and other operational business events. Business Rules: Business rules indicate which states are allowed or required. They should not reference business processes or business tasks by name, just the states they try to achieve. For example, a business rule might be: A claimant may be notified that a claim has been denied only if the specific reason(s) for denial have been determined. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ This post excerpted from our new book (Oct, 2011) Building Business Solutions: Business Analysis with Business Rules. See: http://www.brsolutions.com/b_building_business_solutions.phpTags: business processes vs. business rules, business vocabulary, fact model, processes vs. rules, state, structured business vocabulary
Tom Debevoise
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Hi Ron,
I agree with your points. As it happens I also wrote a few words on this from the detailed modeling perspective:
http://www.tomdebevoise.com/blog/2011/12/11/ten-business-rules-usage-patterns-in-bpm-and-business-events.html
We describe how to use rules to model processes that are more focused and more compact.
Tom Debevoise