Model to Program and Blockchain Approaches for Business Processes and Workflows in Finance

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The paper investigates the opportunity of using blockchain technology in the field of insurance. Thus, the topic addressed in the paper is in concordance with the profile of the journal.
The approach is interesting and aims to extend the meta-model of the UML diagram of activities through specific blockchain parts. The validation of the model is performed through an algorithm for mapping it into Petri nets.

However, I recommend authors to use the main term in a unitary way (block-chain or blockchain). I strongly suggest a uniformity in the text!

In conclusion, the paper is well constructed and can be published after minor revision.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

We would like to thank you for your great effort and time spent in reviewing the manuscript; for your useful feedback and suggestions. We have made changes in the manuscript to reflect the suggestions.

We have updated the manuscript using the main term ‘Blockchain’  in a unitary way.

Finally, we would like to thank the reviewers for their comments, which helped us a lot in improving the quality of the manuscript. We also hope that we have addressed all your comments properly.

Sincerely,
Meriem Kherbouche

Reviewer 2 Report

The current version contains the required content and it is acceptable for publication in the Journal. The paper is clearly written. I have no further suggestions regarding the improvements of the content.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

We would like to thank you for your great effort and time spent reviewing the manuscript. I attached the updated manuscript based on the other reviewer's feedback just for your reference.

Sincerely,
Meriem Kherbouche

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Dear/s Author/s,

Re: Manuscript “Model to Program and Block-chain approaches for Business Processes and Workflows in Finance”

Reviewer’s report:

 

The article covers an interesting topic such as business process modeling and verification, which is essential to improve business organization, especially in such turbulent times as today. The article is well written and structured, but for its publication the authors should make the following modifications:

 

- In the abstract the sector to be dealt with is the financial sector and the conclusions are drawn for the insurance sector. One might think that the first encompasses the second, but the sector under study should be clearly unified.

 

- Likewise, in point 3.1. Case studies are not specified for this type of methodology, neither the number of cases treated nor the criteria for their selection.

 

- The discussion seems more like a summary of results than an authentic comparison with other instruments to carry out these modeling and verification of business / commercial processes.

 

- In this sense, the discussion does not confront anything with the theoretical framework. On the other hand, if the conclusions appear comments regarding the theoretical framework, which could be shown in the discussion section. These conclusions have to be shorter, trying to close the research gap that the researcher tries to fill.

 

- It is necessary to update the references. A simple google schoolar search for the keywords "Block-chain" and "financial" for 2021 will yield 7,180 results.

 

Best regards

 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

We would like to thank you for your great effort and time spent in reviewing the manuscript; for your useful feedback and suggestions. We have made changes in the manuscript to reflect the suggestions 

1. The sector to be dealt with is the financial sector, and the conclusions are drawn for the insurance sector. One might think that the first encompasses the second, but the sector under study should be clearly unified. 

• We analyzed different use cases in the financial industry, while we show in-depth possible implementation in the insurance domain, we correct the abstract to tell this. 

2. In point 3.1. Case studies are not specified for this type of methodology, neither the number of cases treated nor the criteria for their selection.

• case studies are recommended in exploratory research as they provide rich data and investigation of contemporary challenges* ** Following this comment in the introduction of the use case section we introduce why so further readers to not have the similar confusion. 

*Yin, R. K. (2009). Case study research: Design and methods (Vol. 5). Sage.

** Eisenhardt, K. M., & Graebner, M. E. (2007). Theory building from cases: Opportunities and challenges. Academy of management journal, 50(1), 25-32.

3. The discussion seems more like a summary of results than an authentic comparison with other instruments to carry out this modeling and verification of business / commercial processes.

• The discussion section is updated based on your inputs (The updates are highlighted).

4. The discussion does not confront anything with the theoretical framework. On the other hand, if the conclusions appear comments regarding the theoretical framework, which could be shown in the discussion section. These conclusions have to be shorter, trying to close the research gap that the researcher tries to fill.

• We outlined the novelty we propose as well as how it advances state of art and how practitioners can use it.

5. Update references It is necessary to update the references. A simple google scholar search for the keywords ‘Blockchain’ and ‘financial’ for 2021 will yield 7,180 results.

• We updated the references in the manuscript.

 

Finally, we would like to thank the reviewers for their comments, which helped us a lot in improving the quality of the manuscript. We also hope that we have addressed all your comments properly.

Sincerely,
Meriem Kherbouche

Reviewer 4 Report

Dear Authors.

Be so kind and check the English language in Your paper - there are many errors, missing letters, comas and numerous repetitions.

f.e.

Line 1 "Business processes modeling and verification became an essential way to control and assure organizational evolution" - this sounds like postulate - where is the source? Are You sure it should be evolution? What about "development" ?

Line 2 - what is the justification for capital letters (needs description)

and many, many more....

A lot of missing comas do the paper very difficult to read

Line 241 - "m" missing

Linę 245 - "d" ?

Line 246 "Acceptance" - why capital letter?

Line 247 "SMS" - the same

Table 1. The diagram/graph should be more precise. Why the empty cells in the left row?

Line 174, 179 - postulates again -the source is needed.

Line 194, 200 - a colon?

Conclusions

As is not clear form me what the aim of this paper was (what is the exact contribution), the research results do not support the conclusions.

What is the novelty factor in this paper?

I perceive this paper as an early draft.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

We would like to thank you for your great effort and time spent in reviewing the manuscript; for your useful feedback and suggestions. We have made changes in the manuscript to reflect the suggestions.

We improved and revised the English in the manuscript.

1. Line 1 "Business processes modeling and verification became an essential way to control and assure organizational evolution" - this sounds like postulate - where is the source? Are You sure it should be evolution? What about "development" ?

•  We use the notion of evolution of enterprise in line with the conference series of the '11th Enterprise Engineering Working Conference',  furthermore with the articles referenced below.
• The digital transformation and involving the disruptive technologies into Financial Services requires profound reorganisation of the entire enterprise through Business Process Management and Modelling. The competition enforces the re-engineering and application of disruptive technologies in Finance through  Financial Service Technologies. This phenomenon makes evolution necessary, instead of the traditional step-by-step development.

• (11th Enterprise Engineering Working Conference (EEWC 2021))
• Zollo M, Cennamo C, Neumann K. Beyond What and Why: Understanding Organizational Evolution Towards Sustainable Enterprise Models. Organization & Environment. 2013;26(3):241-259. doi:10.1177/1086026613496433
• Galbraith, Jay R., The Evolution of Enterprise Organization Designs (August 1, 2012). Journal of Organization Design, Vol. 1, No. 2, pp. 1-13, 2012, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2181930
• Dosi, Giovanni, and Franco Malerba. Organization and Strategy in the Evolution of the Enterprise. London: Palgrave Macmillan UK, 1996. <http://public.eblib.com/choice/PublicFullRecord.aspx?p=6580324>. 
• MARTINEZ, M.T, P FOULETIER, , K.H PARK,  y J FAVREL, . "Virtual enterprise – organisation, evolution and control". International Journal of Production Economics. 2001, vol 74, núm. 1-3, p. 225–238.
• REISMAN, David. Schumpeter's market : enterprise and evolution. Cheltenham, UK Northhampton, MA, USA: E. Elgar Pub, 2004.

1. Line 2 - what is the justification for capital letters (needs description).

• It is partly corrected. ’Business Process Management and Modeling’ - it is a broadly accepted spelling for the denotation of this essential concept. See for example: 

HEPP, M., F. LEYMANN, , J. DOMINGUE, , A. WAHLER,  y D. FENSEL, . Semantic business process management: a vision towards using semantic Web services for business process management. IEEE. 2005.

1. Table 1. The diagram/graph should be more precise. Why the empty cells in the left row?

• The table is updated to address your comment.

1. Line 174, 179 - postulates again -the source is needed.

• Cited in the paper: CHEN, Yan. "Blockchain tokens and the potential democratization of entrepreneurship and innovation". Business Horizons. 2018, vol 61, núm. 4, p. 567–575.

TREIBLMAIER, Horst, UMLAUFF, U y OTHERS, . "Blockchain and the future of work: A self-determination theory approach". Blockchain economics: Implications of distributed ledger technology. 2019, p. 105–124.

CHEN, Yiyan, YE LI,  y CUNJIN LI, . "Electronic agriculture, blockchain and digital agricultural democratization: Origin, theory and application". Journal of Cleaner Production. 2020, vol 268, p. 122071.

The relevant citations are given in the paper.

1. Line 194, 200 - a colon?

• The end of each item in the itemized list has been exchanged for a dot (point). The semicolon is eliminated within the sentence, the text is broken up into two sentences to make it clearer.

1. The aim of this paper was (what is the exact contribution), the research results do not support the conclusions.

• The contribution of our work is to combine blockchain with an activity diagram for business processes, which has never been done before. So, we extended the UML activity diagram by creating a UML profile representing Blockchain, and then converted the resulting diagram into Petri nets.

1. What is the novelty factor in this paper?

• Defining patterns for workflows of Business Processes that intend to use blockchain technologies as services, their progress.
•  The document-oriented approach makes it possible that the software-technology level representation of workflows (e.g.YAWL, XML) and documents can be handled in a unified and uniform way. This method is important when the issues of transparency, traceability, and explainability occur in Business Processes.
• The M-2-P methodology and operationalized algorithms make it possible to generate executable pieces of software in a Service Oriented Architecture. Therefore, this approach supports re-engineering the processes of an enterprise in the compelling circumstances of Digital Transformation. Digital Transformation enforces the application of recent IT technologies.
• The proposed approach is a step towards the use of immutable information architecture through blockchain in a Business Management environment. The immutable architecture provides an advantage in trustability, consistency, integrity, reliability, and robustness of the specific system.

We attached a file that shows the comparison between the previous and the updated version of the manuscript.

Finally, we would like to thank the reviewers for their comments, which helped us a lot in improving the quality of the manuscript. We also hope that we have addressed all your comments properly.

Sincerely,
Meriem Kherbouche

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 4 Report

Dear Authors.

This paper it is "an old wine in a new bottle" and wishful thinking combined. And, as such, should be rejected. Consider my positive review as a credit of trust.

Kind Regards 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

We would like to thank you again for your effort and time spent in reviewing the manuscript; for your feedback and suggestions.

We attempt to do modern, multidisciplinary research, in which we take different views into account, relevant to drive the design and development of solutions, based on blockchain and ledger technologies, in line with the requirements of the journal.

The contribution of our work is putting together different concepts (some already maybe more elaborated in the past) in a new modern way to combine blockchain with an activity diagram for business processes, which has never been done before. So, we extended the UML activity diagram by creating a UML profile representing Blockchain and then converted the resulting diagram into Petri nets. 

To sum up again, as in our responses before in the letter, the novelty of our paper is:

• Defining patterns for workflows of Business Processes that intend to use blockchain technologies as services, their progress.
•  The document-oriented approach makes it possible that the software-technology level representation of workflows (e.g.YAWL, XML) and documents can be handled in a unified and uniform way. This method is important when the issues of transparency, traceability, and explainability occur in Business Processes.
• The M-2-P methodology and operationalized algorithms make it possible to generate executable pieces of software in a Service Oriented Architecture. Therefore, this approach supports re-engineering the processes of an enterprise in the compelling circumstances of Digital Transformation. Digital Transformation enforces the application of recent IT technologies.
• The proposed approach is a step towards the use of immutable information architecture through blockchain in a Business Management environment. The immutable architecture provides an advantage in trustability, consistency, integrity, reliability, and robustness of the specific system.

We have made changes in the manuscript to reflect the suggestions. 

We have included all these reasoning and explanations of our contribution into the discussion part.

Finally, we would like to thank the reviewers for their comments, which helped us a lot in improving the quality of the manuscript. We also hope that we have addressed all your comments properly.

Sincerely,