Abstract:
Strategic processes are high-level business processes; they are distinct from
production workflows. Strategic processes are opportunistic in nature whereas
production workflows are routine. Strategic business processes are decomposed into
goal-driven sub-processes and emergent sub-processes. An intelligent multi-agent
system manages strategic business processes. Each player is supported by an agent.
The system manages goal-driven sub-processes and manages the commitments that
players make to each other during emergent sub-processes. Commitments are derived
through a process of inter-agent negotiation that considers each individual's
constraints and performance statistics. The conceptual agent architecture is a threelayer
Belief-Desire-Intention (BDI), hybrid architecture. The system adapts its
behaviour on the basis of performance estimates that are provided by the individual
agents in contract net style bids for work. The system has been trialed on business
process management in a university administrative context.
