BPMNexus Professional Network

Was just invited to join this professional group called BPMNexus. Seems to be garnering a lot of attention from BPM professionals. As we say in OZ, "Give it a burl!"

Ross

Visualisation by Story Telling

Have just finished watching Battlestar Galactica, Season 4. Loved it. Have a soft spot for melodrama, and a good twisted plotline.

What has it to do with process modelling? Well, it struck me that a process model is a story, just like those used in entertainment programs such as BSG. It is the storyline of work performed within an organisation by people. Stories are also often described as people making choices, this choice making is another aspect of workflow.

So, can a story approach be applied to process visualisation? Humans have a long oral tradition in many societies of using story tellers to communicate information. The question the occurs to me, is whether a story is an engaging and easy to remember form of communication for educational purposes about processes.

I guess any teacher will tell you that a good story engages children. Have not read any information about whether this form is useful for technical information communication, so am speaking off the top of my head here. But, it is worth a thought, and I think I will return to this topic later.

Ross

Second Life and Medical Processes

Interesting post at the Dr Yesha blog about medical training in Second Life. Seems that Health is now a big user of virtual environments, with a lot of research being performed into its benefits. Intersects with a lot of my research with the Smart Services CRC in Australia.

Back on a Positive Note

Has been a while since I posted on this blog. Have been very busy with various papers and research and other work. So, thought I would begin the return with a reference to the positive results from Second Life's economy in this article. Have noticed myself that the online numbers of people has actually been steadily rising each time I log into the virtual world.

As I have suggested before, once the Gartner hype cycle dies, we will see the real applications emerge for such virtual world technology. Seems the savings in cost for in-world meetings is becoming attractive now, with the GFC draining a lot of travel budgets.

Ross