Designing processes - EMC Community Network

Monitoring Business Activity
• purpose of report
• report type (management report, operational report)
• report columns
• a description of drill-down relationships (both single and multi-drill-down reports)
• audience
• frequency and timing
• report filters and dashboard filters (both default and initial filters)
• graphical representation
Providing a sample of the report helps identify the attributes that must be monitored in the process.
The easiest way to design mock-ups is with Microsoft Excel where reports can be formatted numerous
ways (tables, pie charts, bar charts, and so on). Although a fairly simple example, the following
mock-up highlights that vendor and amount attributes must be monitored within the invoice process.
In addition, since this report calculates an average amount, we know that aggregation is also required.
This mock-up provides important information that impacts the design of your process.
Identifying reports that rely on aggregation is an important part of defining report requirements. BAM
provides three methods of aggregating report data. First, there is report aggregation which is based on
instance-level data. Then, there is server aggregation where data is automatically aggregated for nine
different time intervals (5 minutes, daily, and so on). And finally, there is custom aggregation. The
Business Activity Monitor Implementation Guide has more information on each type of aggregation. In
terms of planning, anticipating the type of aggregation you require is helpful. For example, if you have
high-volume processes where thousands of instances are running each day, then report aggregation is
not recommended. Attempting to aggregate large volumes of instance data (on request) consumes
high server memory resources and can result in poor response time.
Dashboard design considerations
There are several best practices that relate to BAM dashboard design.
90 EMC Documentum xCelerated Composition Platform Version 1.6 Best Practices Guide