Process Approach-Based Simulation Project Life Cycle: PAB-SPLC

Abstract

Simulation is one of the most effective decision support tools available to designers and managers of complex systems. In particular, discrete-event simulation is widely used in a wide variety of fields, such as industry and production, finance and economics, or even health and services. In addition, the conduct of a simulation project is of extreme importance, in order to carry out any simulation study. Our objective in this study is to propose a life cycle of a simulation project which is based on the process approach, the PAB-SPLC, as a "Process Approach Based Simulation Project Life Cycle". The choice of the process approach is justified by its agility and its inclusion in the quality approach of process management. The process approach will allow us to separate the managerial, operational, and support aspects, as well as to reach a certain level of detail on the sequence of sub-processes and tasks or activities of the simulation, while specifying the stakeholders concerned at each time, which will make our future simulation process PAB-SPLC a kind of roadmap for the development of a simulation project. Thus, we proceeded in this study to the modeling of the PAB-SPLC, based on the concepts of the process approach, then to its formalization according to the BPMN standard.