Actual process: a research program

Abstract

Most process research relies heavily on the use of terms and concepts whose validity depends on a variety of assumptions to be met. As it is difficult to guarantee that they are met, such work continually runs the risk of being invalid. We propose a different and complementary approach to understanding process: Perform all description bottom-up and based on hard data alone. We call the approach actual process and the data actual events. Actual events can be measured automatically. This paper describes what has been done in this area already and what are the core problems to be solved in the future.