At the moment, there is a project within the Australian Bureau of Statistics called the Prices System Improvement Project (PSIP). The objective of PSIP is to undertake an improvement of the Prices business processes and the system that supports the Prices business functions.
As part of this project, the Prices business processes were mapped to GSBPM and is a great example of how a non standard collection can be mapped.
This work raised two particular issues about how Prices business processes map to the GSBPM sub processes. These are outlined below:
1) Phase 2
Prices have a system which is used to physically design and populate the index tree structure. There was discussion within the ABS about whether this physical design (where the theoretical design of the tree structure is brought to reality and populated) belonged in Phase 2 (Design) or 3 (Build). It was decided that the GSBPM is clear that Phase 3 is the building of Systems and Workflows, not the implementation of a design from Phase 2.
2) Sub processes 5.8 (Finalise data files) and 6.1 (Prepare draft outputs).
The discussion about to these two sub processes was in relation to where the calculation of additional Aggregate measures (Points Contribution, Points Change, Percentage Change etc) belonged.
Initially, these measures were mapped to 6.1 on the basis of the GSBPM wording "This sub-process is where data collected are transformed into statistical outputs". However, other stakeholders argued that calculation of all Aggregate measures should be concluded at the end of Phase 5, and not be part of Phase 6. The term statistical outputs should not be confused with final Aggregate measures. It was decided that the mapping of the calculation of additional Aggregate measures did belong to sub-process 5.8 - Finalise Data Files.