1 Alert-based e-Business Process Management and Decision Support Dickson K.W. Chiu Senior Member, IEEE

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS2 Agenda Introduction and Background Case-study: Medical House-call System Some Design Details Applicability and Advantage Alert-based Service Speedup Ongoing Related Research Future Work and Summary

3 Introduction and Background

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS4 New Requirements of e-Business Process Management and Decision Support Process execution often requires human decision making in the execution In a highly dynamic environment, processes may raise the requirement for urgent attention, especially when there is a competition of resources. The priority and urgency of the process is captured with the concept of an alert. Such situations demand to improve the response time of some currently executing instances – service improvement. Alert-based information and process management to facilitate decision support improvement.

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS5 Strategic Information Management Strategic Information Systems help organizations do things better and to win aligned with business goals and strategies Directive 1 - Highly competitive and dynamic Active and timely response to business events for management decisions Timely and effective communications and coordination of personnel (esp. management) Business processes integration with stringent urgency requirements (within the enterprise and with business partners) Directive 2 - Service excellence Service-oriented economy Quality value-added services provided over the Internet (e-Services) Alert Management System (AMS) Alerts - urgent / critical messages Routing, monitoring, and logging the alerts Find suitable human attention / services dynamically

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS6 Project Background Motivated by exception handling requirements in workflow management systems (WFMS) D.K.W. Chiu, Q. Li and K. Karlapalem. A Meta Modeling Approach for Workflow Management System Supporting Exception Handling. Information Systems, 24(2): , D.K.W. Chiu, Q. Li and K. Karlapalem. Web Interface-Driven Cooperative Exception Handling in ADOME Workflow Management System. Information Systems, 26(2):93-120, D.K.W. Chiu, K. Karlapalem, Q. Li and E. Kafeza. Workflow Views Based E-Contracts in a Cross-Organization E-Service Environment. Distributed and Parallel Databases, 12(2-3): , S.C. Cheung and D.K.W. Chiu. Cross-Organizational Process Exceptions. RGC Grant (HKUST 6170/03E) Capture the essences of workflow development and management methodology Light-weight system integration platform

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS7 Initial Research on This Topic Focus on B2B e-Services D.K.W. Chiu, Benny Kwok+, Ray Wong+, E. Kafeza and S.C. Cheung. Alert Driven E-Services Management, 37th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS37), 1/2004, (BEST PAPER AWARD, Decision Technologies Track). (+PTMSc student) Focus on medical applications D.K.W. Chiu, Benny Kwok+, Ray Wong+, E. Kafeza, S.C. Cheung, and M. Kafeza. Alert Driven Healthcare Process and Data Integration, IEEE HICSS37, 1/2004. (+PTMSc student) Journal version: conceptual model / management of medical personnel E. Kafeza, D.K.W. Chiu, S.C. Cheung, and M. Kafeza. Alerts in Mobile Healthcare Applications: Requirements and Pilot Study, IEEE Transactions on Information Technology in Biomedicine, 8(2): , 6/ 2004.

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS8 Continuing Research on This Topic Application on e-Learning Dickson K.W. Chiu and Samuel P. M. Choi. Alert Driven Communications Management for Distance Learning, IEEE International Conference on e-Technology, e-Commerce and e- Services (EEE05), Hong Kong, 4/2005, pp Analysis of alert-based service speed-up E. Kafeza, D.K.W. Chiu, and K. Karlapalem. Improving the Response Time of Business Processes: An Alert-based Analytical Approach, HICSS39, 1/2006.

9 Case-study: Medical House-call System

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS10 Case Study – Medical House-call System Both human and computerized systems are involved Business partners have different degree of computerization Web Services supports both type of interactions in a unified framework Web Services

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS11 Use Case Diagram Both human and computerized systems are involved Business partners different degree of computerization Web Services supports both type of interaction in a unified framework

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS12 Overall Approach Objective: robust, efficient, cost effective, simple, and user friendly AMS to improve communications Detailed requirements were elicited and formulated into an alert conceptual model Sketched an overall system architecture Worked out the detailed mechanisms for each components of the system Alert management policies from business goals and strategies could be adapted to handle various situations Prototyping with phases: establish a computerized call center to manage all the alerts, replacing the current manual system extend the system to connect to business partners to form a service grid include further intelligence into the system, e.g., advanced capability reasoning, scheduling with mobile location dependent information, service negotiation, integration with traffic routing

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS13 Role of Alerts in Strategic IS / DSS Strategic Information Systems and DSS Event / Exception Handling Information / Process Requirements Alerts Managed by AMS Web Services and Mobile Devices What are Alerts? Different from general events, alerts have more specific attributes, e.g., urgency and process requirements. Different from exceptions, they need not relate to abnormal behaviors. asynchronously received through business events / exceptions / incoming requests synchronously generated by internal business application handled by the AMS by requesting services from: internal information systems management / human attention external e-Service providers 3R – Retry, Reroute, Reassign

14 Some Design Details

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS15 Alert Conceptual Model (UML Class Diagram) Schedule Response Flexible Task Role 1..* require Specific Task 1..* Human 1..* Web Service Provider Service Agent 0..n * Capability Profile 11 specify Devices * 1..* * Service Access Points 1..* Alert * send AMS Task 0..* 1 1

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS16 Alert Life Cycle / personnel

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS17 Alert Urgency Elevation Defining the policies according to which the urgency of the alert will be “elevated” Example Urgency LevelAction Urgentdefault – notify the selected agent Very UrgentSubmit a second alert to the same agent, notifying about the approaching deadline CriticalRedirect the alert to another agent that has the best response time Very CriticalSend the alert to several agents and accept the results of the one that response first, notify an administrator

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS18 System Architecture Database Application Logic Alert Management System Web / WAP Access Alert Web Service Server XSLT Processor Web Front-end Alert Web Services Programmatic Access Public UDDI Registry Alert TriggeredAction Alert Input XSLT Style Sheets Desktop LaptopPDA Mobile PatientDoctorNurse/ Helper Call Center Administrative Staff Hospitals Medical Partners Internet Medical House-Call System Alert

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS19 Sample Screen – Doctor Selection

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS20 Sample Alert Acknowledgement User Interface

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS21 Status Monitoring

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS22 Alert Web Services Summary Service Name: requestAlert Input: AlertID, RequestorID, AlertMessage, Roles, Urgency, ResponseRequired ( TRUE | FALSE ), Deadline Response: AlertID, ServicePartnerID, Ack (Confirmed | Denied | Deferred), ResponseMessage, AlertReceiptTime Service Name: cancelAlert Input: AlertID, RequestorID Response: Ack (Confirmed | Denied | Deferred ) Service Name: checkAlertStatus Input: AlertID, RequestorID Response: Alert Status Service Name: listActiveAlerts Input: (TaskID | ServicePartnerID),, RequestorID Response: List of pending alerts associated Service Name: receiveDeferredResponse Input: Item AlertID, ServicePartnerID, ResponseMessage, AlertReceiptTime Response: Ack (Confirmed, NotConfirmed )

23 Applicability and Advantage Technical Management

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS24 Applicability – Process of the Call Center

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS25 Applicability – Example Process for Data Integration

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS26 Applicability to Strategic IS – Decision Process Improvement AMS is a unified platform supporting operational, tactical, and strategic decision making seek different level of attention depending on alert’s nature alert “elevation” Improves communications and coordination of management / personnel Anytime anywhere multi-platform alerts for management decisions Right person at right time with right information Automatic retry of calls and routing Accountability - logging and monitoring Mobile workforce management Captures management knowledge and experience Alert management policies Addressing urgency requirements Avoiding errors and help handle exceptions

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS27 Applicability to Strategic IS – Service Improvement Improves e-Services provision Automation of call center which is a bottleneck in the whole e-Service process Productivity improvement and cost reduction Clients / partners can request service via Web, mobile devices, and even an emergency button Timely services Business partners & service personnel form a service grid B2B system integration - convergence of disparate business functionalities Increase in business opportunities Relationships improvement more “transparent” business process operations quality services

28 Alert-based Service Speedup

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS29 Service Speedup Based on Alerts Exceptions to first-come-first-served policy: earlier execution of selected process Measure the trade-off of speed-up, its cost, and the effect to others. Aim at speed-up for alerted activities that requested speed-up within the requested amount However might not be able to achieve speed-up for all Even some speed up, some slow down  Search problem (n!)p combinations for p services; queue length n exhaustive search infeasible algorithms developed are mainly for static cases inapplicable for dynamic scheduling  We propose a tailored polynomial time heuristics Maximum Position First (MPF) MPF SiMilar Duration (MPF-MD)

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS30 Maximum Position First (MPF) algorithm Achieve as much speed-up as possible for all activities that have requested speed-up Putting in the first queue positions those tasks that are further behind in the queue Those in the back of the queue are served first and they are pushed as much forward as possible Swap front positions with back ones Swap could be more than the requested Drawback: when small amounts of speed-up are requested, activities are speeded up more than required, forcing the rest to slow down unnecessarily.

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS31 MPF SiMilar Duration Algorithm (MPF-MD) Swapping positions with other tasks that are ahead in the queues and have similar duration If more than one qualified element, selects the element with the smaller position Not so disruptive Cost factors

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS32 Comparing Different Speedup Algorithms Different algorithms cater for different situations Multiple step speed-up algorithms will try to achieve the required speedup as much as possible over time One step algorithms will achieve as much speed-up as possible and as soon as possible MPF algorithm may slow-down other speeded-up activities MPF-SD algorithm can guarantee that no activity that requested a speed-up is slowed-down - milder version of one-shot MPF “Locking” policy where tasks that belong to activities that are delayed beyond a threshold are exempted from being swapped

33 Ongoing Related Research

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS34 Ongoing Related Research – Cross-organizational Process Management Follow-up Research Question: What (and when) are urgent / exceptions? How important / urgent are they? Advanced match-making An ER^EC Framework for e-Contract Modeling, Enactment and Monitoring, Data and Knowledge Engineering, 51(1): 31-58, Workflow View Driven Cross-Organizational Interoperability in a Web Service Environment, Information Technology and Management, 5(3/4): , An Architecture for E-Contract Enforcement in an E-service Environment. HICSS36, 1/2003 (best paper nominee) Developing Workflow-based Information Integration (WII) with Exception Support in a Web Services Environment, HICSS37 Systematic Interaction Management in a Workflow View Based Business-to-business Process Engine, HICSS38 (journal version submitted to ACM ToIT)

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS35 Ongoing Related Research – m-Services (IS availability, adaptability) A Three-Tier View Methodology for adapting M-services, IEEE Trans on System, Man & Cybernetics, Part A, 33(6): , Nov  Business process adaptation at all 3-tiers based on platform capability with views  front-end user-interface view  application logic / process (workflow) view  back-end database view  Conceptual model and implementation framework  Formal consistency criteria for adaptation  Service negotiation case study  Research Direction  location dependent and context-based services (ICEC 2006 paper)  Alerts applied for multi-platform notification  Agent-based (mobile) workforce management H.F. Leung, D.K.W. Chiu & S.C. Cheung RGC Grant CUHK 4190/03E Wrapper for existing Web sites to become e-/m-services Integrating Legacy Sites into Web Services with WebXcript, IJ Cooperative IS, 14(1):25-44, (*FYP students)

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS36 Ongoing Related Research – CRM and Enterprise Content Management An Event Driven Approach to Customer Relationship Management in an e-Brokerage Environment. HICSS36, 1/2003. (FYP) (Journal version conditionally accepted to Decision Support Systems) Turn knowledge into actions Complaints, abnormal transactions, (changes in) customers’ behavior => alerts An Integrated Web Services Architecture for Financial Content Management, HICSS37, 1/2004, (best paper nominee). (PTMSc) (journal version submitted to EJIS) Timeliness requirement of financial content approval and distribution Privacy and Access Control in Financial Enterprise Content Management, HICSS38, 1/2005 A Watermarking Infrastructure for Enterprise Document Management, HICSS36, 1/2003.

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS37 Ongoing Related Research – Agent based Computing  AMS provides platform for intelligent communication support  Agent-based (mobile) workforce management H.F. Leung, D.K.W. Chiu & S.C. Cheung RGC Grant CUHK 4190/03E A Multi-Agent Infrastructure for Mobile Workforce Management in a Service Oriented Enterprise, HICSS38, Jan 2005 A Multi-Modal Agent Based Mobile Route Advisory System for Public Transport Network, HICSS38, Jan 2005 Next Generation Multi-platform Tourist Assistance Systems: A Multi-agent and Semantic Web Approach, ICEC 2006 Making Personalized Recommendations to Customers in a Service- oriented Economy: a Quantitative Decision Model Based on Reputation and Risk Attitude, ICEC 2006 adapt agent reputation model to real-life service provision strategy Legal Issues in Agents for Electronic Contracting, HICSS38, 1/2005 Constraint-based Negotiation in a Multi-Agent Information System with Multiple Platform Support, HICSS37, 6/2004. Workflow Management Systems as Meta-Agents in a Multi-Agent Information System. AOIS-2001, 6/2001.

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS38 Ongoing Related Research – Negotiation Support Systems Alerts for process support and offer / bid notification D.K.W. Chiu, S.C. Cheung, P.C.K. Hung, S.Y.Y. Chiu* and K.K. Chung*. Developing e-Negotiation Process Support with a Meta-modeling Approach in a Web Services Environment, Decision Support Systems, 40:(1)51-69, (*FYP students) Meta-model applicable for 3 kinds of e-Negotiation process (1) Bargaining (2) Auction (3) Request for Proposal Implementation framework with Web services (FYP prototype) Focus on technology support for effective negotiation Constraint-based Negotiation in a Multi-Agent Information System with Multiple Platform Support, HICSS37, 1/2004. On e-Negotiation of Unmatched Logrolling Views, HICSS36, 1/2003 (best paper nominee). (journal version under revision for JMIS) Facilitating e-Negotiation Process with Semantic Web Technologies, HICSS38, 1/2005

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS39 IS Case Studies with MSc Students Web Services course papers HKUST Web-service Based Information Integration for Decision Support: A Case Study on e-Mortgage Contract Matchmaking Service, HICSS39, 1/2006. e-Government Integration with Web Services and Alerts: A Case Study on an Emergency Route Advisory System in Hong Kong, HICSS39, 1/2006. Cooperative Brokerage Integration for Transaction Capacity Sharing: A Case Study in Hong Kong, HICSS39, 1/2006. Credibility Relationship Management in a Web Service Integration Environment, 4th ICIS Workshop on e-Business, 12/2005. Enhancing Availability of Information and Towards Freedom of News Distribution: Supporting Small-scale News Agencies with a Web- Service Infrastructure. (submitted) Developing a Distributed e-Monitoring System for Website and Web Services: An Experience Report with Free Libraries and Tools. (submitted) More to come…

40 Future Work and Summary

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS41 Future Work  Other application domains – tourism, CRM, …  Interfacing and platform-specific issues  Location dependent applications  Workforce management  Mobile CRM  Analysis and simulation of alert-based speed-up  Inter-relations among alerts  Failure of commitments and their relation to contract enforcement  Impact of cancellations, other possible exceptions

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS42 Summary  A conceptual model for specifying alerts based on the requirements of business processes and a set of routing parameters  A mechanism for (re-)routing alerts and increasing their urgency when alerts are not acknowledged or processed within deadline  A practical architecture for the AMS based on contemporary Web Services and mobile technologies – supports human and programmatic interfaces  Improved information and process management for decision support  Improved service provision through speed-up  Flexible, reusable, light-weight AMS plugged into other systems  Looking for research collaborations (esp. domain knowledge, say, logistics, tourism) for cross-disciplinary research and empirical studies in more depth and wider scope

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS43 Q&A Thank you!

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS44 Service Provider Matchmaking Algorithm searches for those personnel / service providers that can play the role required for the alert Selects those that have a response time that is less than the deadline If the matching is successful, one personnel / service provider is selected according to a user-supplied cost function In case no matching is available, the algorithm upgrades the alert by expanding the roles whenever possible

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS45 System Architecture

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS46 Evaluation by Medical Professionals AMS Advantages Make sure that an alert can reach the person who has to be notified The inclusion of multiple mobile devices and platforms helps both the medical professions and the patients The implementation of an urgency policy that uses concurrently multiple devices to communicate the alert can increase the probability to inform the person on time An automated alert can make sure that the information is passed accurately and completely Capability to choose the kind of received information, reception devices, and desired time slots Infrastructure Benefits Total solution healthcare chain workflow integration Save much paper work and administration guides call center operators to choose the right medical professionals to minimize possible specialty mismatch

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS47 Advantage of an AMS The urgency requirements, associated interactions with service providers, and the monitoring required by the administrators can be systematically and modularly captured into an AMS, instead of scattering around in the main workflow specification. The logic for sending, routing, and monitoring these alerts is supported in the AMS and can be heavily reused. AMS evolves from the exception handling and user-interface mechanisms of our ME-ADOME WFMS, by factoring out and extending, in particular, urgency requirements. Physical execution of individual tasks of regular processes is outside the scope of the AMS and is in capture in the application logic of individual information systems which can be a WFMS as well An AMS is light-weight and highly coherent, but loosely coupled with other sub-systems, enabling it to be plugged into any information system that needs such services

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS48 Evaluation by Medical Professionals AMS Advantages Make sure that an alert can reach the person who has to be notified The inclusion of multiple mobile devices and platforms helps both the medical professions and the patients The implementation of an urgency policy that uses concurrently multiple devices to communicate the alert can increase the probability to inform the person on time An automated alert can make sure that the information is passed accurately and completely Capability to choose the kind of received information, reception devices, and desired time slots Infrastructure Benefits Total solution healthcare chain workflow integration Save much paper work and administration guides call center operators to choose the right medical professionals to minimize possible specialty mismatch

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS49 Alert Log Module Table State Pos Service 1 1,12,13,16,15,14,1 Service 2 4,41,52,42,53,41,4 Service 3 5,46,43,54,51,72,7 Service 4 5,56,53,75,74,76,7 6 patients (activities A1 to A6) each having tasks t1: have given blood and wait for the results, t2: given their insurance and wait for credit verification t3: given permission for date retrieval and wait for the creation of their medical history (it might involve retrieval by several health care resources) t4: wait to see the same specific physician Total 24 tasks that are waiting to be served

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS50 Task Durations and Positional Values Pos d agent d agent d agent d agent Pos pv agent pv agent pv agent pv agent , where d tkj is the duration of task t kj

Alert-based Process Mgmt and DSS51 Activity Position Value and Vector If an activity has submitted more than one task to a given web-service, then we deduct the duration added by the previous tasks Represents the total waiting time - metrics The set of positional values of all the activities in a given table form its positional vector PV