Towards dynamic processes-of-business processes : a new understanding

Purpose: The main purpose of this work is to overcome the difficulty to manage large, dynamic business processes formed from the complicated interplay of business processes of distinct organizations, which take part of strategic alliances of organizations (joint ventures and mergers and acquisitions) and have their software systems as part of complex, large software-intensive systems called Systems of Systems (SoS). Hence, the authors introduce the novel concept of Processes-of-Business Processes (PoP), deepening on their characteristics and related key terms. Design/methodology/approach: Based on the systematically retrieved and analyzed literature and on the authors’ experience from research/industrial projects, the authors defined PoP and have applied them in the Brazilian public health SoS, which involve several organizations and their business processes and their independent software systems as well. Findings: Provided by PoP, a new understanding of the large, dynamic business processes of alliances of organizations is fundamental to advance both the state of the art and the state of the practice on business process management. Research limitations/implications: The adoption of PoP in other real-world scenarios is still required to get quantitative evidence. Practical implications: The adoption of PoP can certainly contribute to the success of new businesses and even promoting sustainability and longevity of SoS, which are in fact deeply impacted by business processes. Originality/value: The concept of PoP can change the mindset of the research community and practitioners about how large, dynamic business processes should be seen and further managed.