Organization models for cooperative office applications

Abstract

Regulated communication and cooperation between members of an enterprise relics on organization structures of the enterprise. Ibis is explained in the introduction implying that an organization model is necessary for realizing application systems to support this type of cooperative work. The main part of this paper describes the Organization and Resources Management system ORM which makes it possible to build organization models and use them in application systems. As an example, the use of ORM in a workflow management system is described. ORM stores its models in a relational database with an SQL interface and implements a set of automatic inheritance rules for authority assignments to organizational entities. These rules follow common organizational practice. Problems of implementing these features with a relational database arc discusscd. Finally, directions for future developments and exploration areas are suggested.