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On model-based analysis of organizational structures: an assessment of current modeling approaches and application of multi-level modeling in support of design and analysis of organizational structures

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Abstract

Conceptual modeling promises to support various analysis questions on organizational structures, such as allocation of tasks, responsibilities, and authority in an organization. In this paper, we first synthesize requirements on an organizational structure analysis from the business scholar literature and assess to what extent and how current modeling languages fulfill these. In particular, we find limitations in the covered scope as well as the information processing capabilities of the reviewed approaches. Second, as a response to identified gaps, we propose multi-level modeling and integrated modeling and programming as a way to support design and analysis of organizational structure. We use the structure of universities as a case scenario. This paper is an extension of our earlier work. Firstly, we add an explicit set of requirements derived from business scholar literature. Secondly, we draw a comparison to the abstraction mechanisms used in conventional meta-modeling, as prominently exemplified by UML class diagrams, and we critically discuss multi-level modeling. Finally, we discuss a prototypical implementation of our multi-level model in the XModeler software tool.

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Notes

  1. https://www.hochschulkompass.de/.

  2. http://www.uni-due.de.

  3. i-star is an interesting case here. On the one hand, its strategic dependency diagram allows for modeling dependencies within an organizational structure, e.g., cf. the example in [22, p. 128] to indicate that a “QA manager” provides software testing guidelines to the “testing unit.” Compared to the other modeling approaches, this provides added rationalization capabilities. However, on the other hand, i-star does not contain dedicated concepts and corresponding semantics for modeling organizational units, having “agent” and “position” stand in for these. See, e.g., [22, p. 128], where a testing unit is modeled as an agent.

  4. https://www.ariscommunity.com/aris-express.

  5. https://www.archimatetool.com/.

  6. Strict meta-modeling, cf. [8, p. 9], states that “if a model A is an instance of another model B then every element of A is an instance of some element in B. In other words, it interprets the instance of relationship at the granularity of individual model elements.”

  7. Please note that there are various modeling tools and frameworks that support multi-level modeling, such as Melanee [6], DeepTelos [48], MetaDepth [59], DeepJava [56], DeepRuby [79], and XModeler [18]. All of these tools, even if they support the same family of approaches, pursue a different strategy with respect to creating a multi-level model and supporting model execution. For instance, having a look at approaches supporting potency, DeepJava extends the Java programming language with multiple meta-levels and deferred instantiation through potency, which can be added to attributes, methods and classes. A compiler transforms DeepJava code into plain Java, cf. [56]. In turn, Melanee provides support for the potency-based design of domain-specific languages. Melanee supports model execution through a service API and a plug-in mechanism, and the communication between the modeling and execution environment can be realized using socket-based communication [6]. Finally, MetaDepth [59, 60], which is a potency-based multi-level meta-modeling tool, supports textual modeling only. In order to enable code generation from MetaDepth models, MetaDepth is integrated with the Epsilon Generation Language. The latter is a template-based language which generates code from models that conform to a meta-model [91].

  8. A clabject is a construct which has both a class facet and an object facet, cf. [7]. This allows one to treat classes as objects simultaneously.

  9. Strict modeling in deep instantiation does not require all elements within a level to have a direct ontological type. As such new elements can be introduced, cf. [5].

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  1. Information Systems and Enterprise Modeling, University of Duisburg-Essen, Essen, Germany

    Sybren de Kinderen & Monika Kaczmarek-Heß

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  1. Sybren de Kinderen
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  2. Monika Kaczmarek-Heß
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Correspondence to Sybren de Kinderen.

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Communicated by Iris Reinhartz-Berger and Sérgio Guerreiro.

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de Kinderen, S., Kaczmarek-Heß, M. On model-based analysis of organizational structures: an assessment of current modeling approaches and application of multi-level modeling in support of design and analysis of organizational structures. Softw Syst Model 19, 313–343 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10270-019-00767-4

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