Toward Process Variability Management in Online Examination Process in German Universities: A State of the Art

Abstract

AbstractIn contemporary organizations, multiple variants of the same business process are often considerable. Such business process variability has caused considerable challenges, both while modeling processes and in their execution. In order to develop a new approach to managing process variants, or extend an existing one, in this research, we review the state of the art in a particular area: online examination processes. We show to what extent variability should be considered in exam processes, whether this is due to special legal restrictions and regulations, different exam frameworks, or even different technical infrastructure. This could be the foundation for developing an approach to managing process variability in the field of e-assessment. Initial findings indicate that examination processes have many similarities, but also considerable differentiation. Therefore, there an appropriate model needs to be developed in order to manage variability in e-assessment and the developed approach must then be validated in identifying faculties. This paper constitutes a first step in this direction.