=Paper=
{{Paper
|id=Vol-2683/paper10
|storemode=property
|title=Problems of automation of the workflow process in the higher education institutions
|pdfUrl=https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-2683/paper10.pdf
|volume=Vol-2683
|authors=Viktor Kyrychenko,Viktor Volkov
}}
==Problems of automation of the workflow process in the higher education institutions==
https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-2683/paper10.pdf
Problems of Automation of the Workflow Process
in the Higher Education Institutions
V.I. Kyrychenko V.E. Volkov
Educational department Department of Theoretical Mechanics
Odessa National Academy Of Food Technologies Odessa I.I. Mechnikov National University
Odessa, Ukraine Odessa, Ukraine
rekvuem@gmail.com viktor@te.net.ua
Abstract—Problems connected with the automation of the One of the ways to solve problems of the document flow
document flow in higher education institutions are investigated. is to automate this process. Automation of the document flow
There are no automated control systems aimed to optimal and its optimal control is the main problem to which the
control of the document flow today. The document flow is present study is dedicated.
studied as specific technological process and special information
technology. Proper analysis of the documentation flow of
orders for the expulsion of students is done as an example. It is II. THE MAIN CONTENT
proved that full automation is impossible. It is proved also that There are automated control systems (ACS) aimed to
control of the document circulation and the documentation flow control document flow [1], but these systems do not meet
must be not only technological (by signals), but also present-day requirements of the higher education institutions
organizational (by directives), and the problem of optimization in Ukraine.
for the control of the document flow must be solved
simultaneously with the problem of the control and not after it Improvement of ACS for the document management
(as usual). requires not only the implantation of modern information
technologies and computer facilities. It is necessary to
Keywords—document flow, higher education institutions, improve or to change completely organizational,
control, automated control systems, optimal control, information mathematical, information and software support of the ACS
technology [2]. It should be noted also that the problem of optimal
control of the document flow has never been considered.
I. INTRODUCTION Effective automated control of the document flow needs
Document flow is an activity on the conduct of the adequate model of this process. In turn, modeling of the
movement of documents at the enterprise (office, institution). document flow requires to analyze carefully the document
For every single document such movement takes place from flow as a control object. Such analysis is one of the main aims
the moment of document’s creation or the moment of its of this study.
receipt from the other organization to the moment, when
appropriate actions are completed: sending the document to Analyzing the document flow as a control object it is
other organizations and/or sending it to the archive. possible to consider:
There are lots of problems connected with the document • single document (order, directive, etc.);
flow in higher education institutions. These problems can be • directly the flow of documentation (it is called also the
devided into three main groups: workflow);
• receipt of documents by executors (performers) after • technological documental process as a whole.
the required terms, which makes it impossible to carry
out the necessary actions on time; Firstly let us consider flow of documentation as a control
object.
• contradictions between different documents, which
lead to impossibility of immediate execution of There are:
necessary actions and prolong the document • input documentation flows;
processing;
• internal documentation flows;
• duplication of documents, which also leads to
increasing the time for the document processing. • output documentation flows.
All these problems are typical for the document flow in Let us consider as an example the documentation flow
any large organization or big enterprise (not only in a college, of orders for the expulsion of students. To prepare these
an academy or a university). orders it is necessary:
Copyright © 2019 for this paper by its authors. Use permitted under Creative Commons License Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
• to collect all examination results or test results and to directives and orders. By the way such organizational control
analyze these data from the point of view of operating also must be optimized.
procedures, internal instructions and national laws
It is also obvious that control systems aimed to control
central legislations), and then to form lists of students
document circulations or documentation flows in higher
for expulsion;
education institutions (and in other big organizations) can be
• to make projects of orders, to coordinate orders with only automated systems, but can never be automatic systems.
various managers and structures; Full automation of the document flows control is
impossibility. The reason of that is connected with strong
• to issue already agreed orders; influence of human factor on the process of the document
• to send out orders to the appropriate executors. circulation.
Every operation looks rather simple, but combining of The process of the document flow itself can be considered
different operations leads to the mentioned above difficulties. as a special information technology (technology of
It is typical for most of the different documentation flows in a accumulation, processing, storage and transmission of
higher education institution (not only for the documentation information). A characteristic feature (even attributive
flow of orders for the expulsion of students). feature) of the implementation of any information technology
(especially in the transmission of information, i.e.
It is also clear that errors in processing of the communication, and in the processing of information) is the
documentation flow of orders for the expulsion of students presence of a creative element. This creative element is
can be rather significant, since they affect the fate of people. always connected with people who have “only” to adopt this
Some of these errors can be defined as critical errors. Such technology. So the document flow processing needs creativity
(critical) mistakes must be avoided at all costs. That is one of coupled with precision and execution of rules. It can be
the reasons, why the process can’t be automated fully (that named “robust bureaucracy”.
means that participation of human beings in the mentioned
above process is absolutely necessary). III. CONCLUSIONS
Proper analysis of the documentation flow of orders for The following conclusions can therefore be drawn from
the expulsion of students as technological process makes it the foregoing.
possible to highlight control parameters and managed – There are no automated control systems aimed to
parameters. Orders for the expulsion of students are typical optimal control of the document circulation, because the
one (precisely for universities, colleges and faculties). So problem of optimization for the document circulation has
mentioned above analysis can be extended to other types of never been considered (surprisingly!). There are ACS for
orders in higher education institutions. control of the document circulation, but these systems are not
The control objective is to minimize the time for effective enough, because they are obsolete (at least morally)
movement of orders from initiators to executors, but without and they are aimed to carry out only technological (technical)
increase in the number of critical errors. So the problem of control without improving or changing organizational
the optimal control of the document flow is inextricably management.
linked with the problem of control (regulation) of the – Problems connected with the document flow in higher
document flow. But optimization must be achieved without education institutions are similar to such problems in any big
losses in reliability, i.e. without increasing of number of office or organization. But ways of solving these problems in
errors and with preventing of critical errors. a higher education institution are more or less specific,
Achieving of this objective requires not only because they are connected with the features of educational
technological actions and technical novation’s (using modern process. The main purpose of automation in this case is not to
computers and devices, Internet or intranet technologies and increase the incomes of the higher education institution
cloud computing), but also making organizational (although it also has a role to play), but to improve the quality
arrangements. of educational process and, as a result, to raise the level of
education
So control of the document flow and the documentation
circulation is not only the problem of technological – Effective control of the document flow needs adequate
(technical) control, but it is closely linked with problems of model of this process. By the way mathematical model of the
the organizational management. This is exactly the case when document circulation must be rather simple (because
one can speak not about purely technological control, but connections between input parameters and output parameters
about organizational and technological control (management). are not complicated for such processes).
Furthermore, it is very difficult (and sometimes impossible or – The objective of control of the document circulations is
meaningless) to conduct technological control of the to minimize the time for movement of documents from their
document flow without preliminary organizational decisions initiators to direct executors. But such a reduction in time
or activities. cannot be achieved by increasing of the number of errors.
Technological control is carried out by signals, while – Control of the document circulation and the
organizational control (management) is carried out by documentation flow must be not only technological, but also
organizational. Organizational control (organizational information technology is impossible without the essential
management) almost always precedes technological one, but participation of a human being, then, as indicated above, a
they are closely related. Appearance and implementation of document circulation cannot be automated fully.
technical innovations and new classes of hardware and
(especially) software very often lead to the necessity of REFERENCES
organizational changes.
[1] Avtomatizaciya dokumentooborota. Organizaciya elektronnogo
– The process of the document flow (either in higher dokumentooborota na predpriyatii v voprosakh i otvetakh.
education institutions or in other organizations) cannot be Avtomatizirovannye sistemy dokumentooborota [Elektronnyy resurs].
URL: http://www.directum.ru/425833.aspx (data obrashcheniya:
automated fully. 10.12.2016).
– The process of document circulation can be considered [2] [2] R.C.Dorf, R.H. Bishop, Modern Control Systems, Prentice Hall,
2001.
and studied as a special information technology. Therefore,
all the laws of information technology are also valid for the
document circulation. Since the implementation of