Formalizing Agent-Oriented Enterprise Models

This paper proposes an agent-oriented metamodel that provides rigorous concepts for conducting enterprise modelling. The aim is to allow analysts to produce an enterprise model that precisely captures the knowledge of an organization and of its business processes so that an agent-oriented requirements specification of the system-to-be and its operational corporate environment can be derived from it. To this end, the model identifies constructs that permit capturing the intrinsic characteristics of an agent system such as autonomy, intentionality, sociality, identity and boundary, or rational self-interest; an agent being an organizational actor and/or a software component. Such an approach of the concept of agent allows the analyst to have a holistic perspective integrating human and organizational aspects to gain better understanding of business system inner and outer modelling issues. The metamodel has roots in both management theory and requirements engineering. It helps to bridge the gap between enterprise and requirements models proposing an integrated framework, comprehensive and expressive to both managers and software (requirements) engineers