What do Business Process Modelling and Super Mario Bros. have in Common? A Games-perspective on Business Process Modelling

Abstract

At first glance, it might not seem as if there was a tangible connection between playing a video game such as Super Mario World, and creating a business process model in a respective software. However, this paper argues that business process modelling itself can in fact be considered a game, and thus current issues of business process modeling such as insufficient model quality and unmotivated process modellers can be attributed to problems of the underlying “game design”. As a solution, the activity of building tools for business process modeling may also be addressed using game design techniques, thereby allowing the positive impacts and benefits of games on engagement, motivation, training, and performance to be carried over to this non-game context. Such a games-perspective on business process modelling has already been assumed by a small number of researchers, as will be shown through a discussion of related work. Lastly, this paper calls for additional research situated at the intersection between process modelling and games.