aCHAT-WF: Generating conversational agents for teaching business process models

This paper proposes a general approach for using conversational interfaces such as chatbots to offer adaptive learning of business processes in an environment involving different actors. Adaptivity concerns both the content being proposed, the sequence of learning items, and the way the conversation is conducted. The original approach allows the development of sustainable chatbots and empowers various non-technical actors (authors, teachers, publishers, and learners) to control the chatbot features directly. The aCHAT-WF framework (adaptive CHATbot for WorkFlows), proposed in this paper for managing conversational interfaces, conceptually represents all the aspects related to a conversation about business processes, with different facets for the user, the conversation flow, and the conversation contents, combining them to obtain a flexible interaction with the user. The paper focuses on the different preparation phases for instructional material based on Business Process Modeling Notation (BPMN) models, separating the different roles involved in the construction of a chatbot for teaching business processes and with the possibility of defining different styles for the interaction with the users. The proposed method is configuration-driven, to facilitate the separation of the different aspects of the control of the interaction and the delivery of contents.