Knowledge based performance management system

Abstract

An automated system ( 100 ) and method for knowledge based performance management for an organization. After extracting data from existing narrowly focused systems, mission measures and organization levels are defined for one or more organizations. The elements, factors and risks that contribute to mission measure performance by organization level and organization are systematically defined and stored in a ContextBase using up to six context layers. ContextBase information is extracted for specified combinations of context layers, organization levels and organizations as required to produce complete context frames. The complete context frames are then used by a series of applications for reviewing, analyzing, forecasting, planning and optimizing organization performance.

1 - 58 . (canceled) 
     
     
         59 . An apparatus, comprising:
 organization narrow systems,   means for aggregating and analyzing the data from said systems as required to develop context layers from the group consisting of physical, tactical, instant impact, organization, mission, social environment and combinations thereof, and   means for providing access to the data from said systems in accordance with an organization context where the organization context is defined by one or more context layers.   
     
     
         60 . The apparatus of  claim 59  where narrow systems are selected from the group consisting of accounting systems, alliance management systems, asset management systems, brand management systems, budgeting/financial planning systems, business intelligence systems, call management systems, cash management systems, channel management systems, commodity risk management systems, content management systems, contract management systems, credit-risk management system, customer relationship management systems, data integration systems, demand chain systems, decision support systems, document management systems, email management systems, employee relationship management systems, energy risk management systems, executive dashboard systems, expense report processing systems, fleet management systems, fraud management systems, freight management systems, human capital management systems, human resource management systems, incentive management systems, innovation management systems, insurance management systems, intellectual property management systems, intelligent storage systems, interest rate risk management systems, investor relationship management systems, knowledge management systems, learning management systems, location management systems, maintenance management systems, material requirement planning systems, metrics creation system, online analytical processing systems, ontology management systems, partner relationship management systems, payroll systems, performance management systems, price optimization systems, private exchanges, process management systems, product life-cycle management systems, project management systems, project portfolio management systems, revenue management systems, risk management information system, risk simulation systems, sales force automation systems, scorecard systems, sensor grid systems, service management systems, six-sigma quality management systems, strategic planning systems, supply chain systems, supplier relationship management systems, support chain systems, taxonomy development systems, technology chain systems, unstructured data management systems, visitor (web site) relationship management systems, weather risk management systems, workforce management systems, yield management systems and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         61 . The apparatus of  claim 59  where the mission layer identifies the net impact of elements, risks and external factors on one or more mission measures where said measures are selected from the group consisting of alliance risk, brand risk, channel risk, content risk, contingent liabilities, customer risk, customer relationship risk, current operation risk, derivative risk, employee risk, employee relationship risk, energy risk, enterprise risk, external factor risk, event risk, fraud risk, information technology risk, total return, intellectual property risk, investment risk, knowledge risk, market sentiment risk, market risk, market volatility, organization risk, partnership risk, process risk, production equipment risk, product risk, real option risk, technology risk, vendor risk, vendor relationship risk, weather risk, revenue, expense, capital change, alliance return, brand return, channel return, content return, customer return, customer relationship return, current operation return, derivative return, employee return, employee relationship return, enterprise return, external factor return, event return, information technology return, intellectual property return, investment return, knowledge return, market sentiment return, market return, market volatility, organization return, partnership return, process return, production equipment return, product return, real option return, shareholder return, technology return, vendor return, vendor relationship return, alliance value, brand value, channel value, content value, contingent liabilities, customer value, customer relationship value, current operation value, derivative value, employee value, employee relationship value, enterprise value, external factor value, event value, information technology value, intellectual property value, investment value, knowledge value, market sentiment value, market value, market volatility, organization value, partnership value, process value, production equipment value, product value, real option value, technology value, vendor value, vendor relationship value and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         62 . The apparatus of  claim 59  that supports the development of context frames where context frames are defined by attributes selected from the group consisting of mission measures, context layers, organization levels, organizations and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         63 . The apparatus of  claim 59  where the means for providing access to the data from narrow systems in accordance with an organization context further comprises a datamart, a data warehouse, a storage area network or a virtual database. 
     
     
         64 . The apparatus of  claim 59  where mission measures further comprise any quantifiable measure. 
     
     
         65 . The apparatus of  claim 59  that defines an organization ontology. 
     
     
         66 . The apparatus of  claim 59  where the context layers are developed by learning from the data. 
     
     
         67 . The apparatus of  claim 59  where an organization further comprises an organization combination. 
     
     
         68 . The apparatus of  claim 59  that supports the development and alignment of measures by organization level in an automated fashion. 
     
     
         69 . A program storage device readable by machine, tangibly embodying a program of instructions executable by a machine to perform method steps for performing an organization management method, the method steps comprising:
 aggregating data from organization narrow systems and   learning from said data as required to develop one or more contexts for organization performance where said contexts are defined by context layers selected from the group consisting of physical, tactical, instant impact, organization, mission, social environment and combinations thereof.   
     
     
         70 . The program storage device of  claim 69  where the method steps further comprise:
 defining one or more subsets of the organization for separate management using at least a portion of said context,   creating a context frame for the one or more subsets of the organization, and   managing the performance of each of the one or more organization subsets using said context frame and one or more standard applications.   
     
     
         71 . The program storage device of  claim 69  where narrow systems are selected from the group consisting of accounting systems, alliance management systems, asset management systems, brand management systems, budgeting/financial planning systems, business intelligence systems, call management systems, cash management systems, channel management systems, commodity risk management systems, content management systems, contract management systems, credit-risk management system, customer relationship management systems, data integration systems, demand chain systems, decision support systems, document management systems, email management systems, employee relationship management systems, energy risk management systems, executive dashboard systems, expense report processing systems, fleet management systems, fraud management systems, freight management systems, human capital management systems, human resource management systems, incentive management systems, innovation management systems, insurance management systems, intellectual property management systems, intelligent storage systems, interest rate risk management systems, investor relationship management systems, knowledge management systems, learning management systems, location management systems, maintenance management systems, material requirement planning systems, metrics creation system, online analytical processing systems, ontology management systems, partner relationship management systems, payroll systems, performance management systems, price optimization systems, private exchanges, process management systems, product life-cycle management systems, project management systems, project portfolio management systems, revenue management systems, risk management information system, risk simulation systems, sales force automation systems, scorecard systems, sensor grid systems, service management systems, six-sigma quality management systems, strategic planning systems, supply chain systems, supplier relationship management systems, support chain systems, taxonomy development systems, technology chain systems, unstructured data management systems, visitor (web site) relationship management systems, weather risk management systems, workforce management systems, yield management systems and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         72 . The program storage device of  claim 69  where the method steps further comprise:
 storing organization related data in accordance with one or more organization contexts by context layer.   
     
     
         73 . The program storage device of  claim 72  where the means for storing data in accordance with an organization context further comprises a datamart, a data warehouse, a storage area network or a virtual database. 
     
     
         74 . The program storage device of  claim 69  where the method steps further comprise:
 developing and aligning measures by organization level in an automated fashion.   
     
     
         75 . The program storage device of  claim 69  where context frames are defined by attributes selected from the group consisting of mission measures, context layers, organization levels, organizations and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         76 . The program storage device of  claim 69  where the standard applications support organization management activities selected from the group consisting of analysis, forecast, optimization, planning, project management, review, transaction and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         77 . A data method, comprising:
 establishing an interface with a narrow system;   testing the ability of said narrow system to process different types of data from different combinations of context layers using said interface; and   tailoring the data provided to said narrow systems based on the results of said test.   
     
     
         78 . The method of  claim 77  that further comprises assigning a score to each narrow system based on the test results. 
     
     
         79 . The method of  claim 77  that further comprises assigning points for the ability to process data from each of one or more context layers. 
     
     
         80 . The method of  claim 77  that further comprises assigning points for the ability to change the type of data processed from a given context layer. 
     
     
         81 . The method of  claim 77  where narrow systems are selected from the group consisting of accounting systems, alliance management systems, asset management systems, brand management systems, budgeting/financial planning systems, business intelligence systems, call management systems, cash management systems, channel management systems, commodity risk management systems, content management systems, contract management systems, credit-risk management system, customer relationship management systems, data integration systems, demand chain systems, decision support systems, document management systems, email management systems, employee relationship management systems, energy risk management systems, executive dashboard systems, expense report processing systems, fleet management systems, fraud management systems, freight management systems, human capital management systems, human resource management systems, incentive management systems, innovation management systems, insurance management systems, intellectual property management systems, intelligent storage systems, interest rate risk management systems, investor relationship management systems, knowledge management systems, learning management systems, location management systems, maintenance management systems, material requirement planning systems, metrics creation system, online analytical processing systems, ontology management systems, partner relationship management systems, payroll systems, performance management systems, price optimization systems, private exchanges, process management systems, product life-cycle management systems, project management systems, project portfolio management systems, revenue management systems, risk management information system, risk simulation systems, sales force automation systems, scorecard systems, sensor grid systems, service management systems, six-sigma quality management systems, strategic planning systems, supply chain systems, supplier relationship management systems, support chain systems, taxonomy development systems, technology chain systems, unstructured data management systems, visitor (web site) relationship management systems, weather risk management systems, workforce management systems, yield management systems and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         82 . The method of  claim 77  where the context layers are selected from the group consisting of physical, tactical, instant impact, organization, mission, social environment and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         83 . An architecture for use in designing, deploying, and managing a plurality of applications on a distributed computing system for an organization, the architecture comprising: a plurality of layers where at least one layer is an application layer
 where a single set of common applications resident in the application layer manage and optimize a performance of any subset of an organization for a complete context,   where said complete context for an organization subset comprises the context of  claim 105  with one or more quantitative measures for evaluating performance, and   where the common applications incorporate an analysis of a network effect of a plurality of risks and elements of value on one or more performance measures and are selected from the group consisting of analysis, forecast, optimization, planning, project management, review, transaction and combinations thereof.   
     
     
         84 . The software architecture of  claim 83  where a quantitative measures is selected from the group consisting of alliance risk, brand risk, channel risk, content risk, contingent liabilities, customer risk, customer relationship risk, current operation risk, derivative risk, employee risk, employee relationship risk, energy risk, enterprise risk, external factor risk, event risk, fraud risk, information technology risk, total return, intellectual property risk, investment risk, knowledge risk, market sentiment risk, market risk, market volatility, organization risk, partnership risk, process risk, production equipment risk, product risk, real option risk, technology risk, vendor risk, vendor relationship risk, weather risk, revenue, expense, capital change, alliance return, brand return, channel return, content return, customer return, customer relationship return, current operation return, derivative return, employee return, employee relationship return, enterprise return, external factor return, event return, information technology return, intellectual property return, investment return, knowledge return, market sentiment return, market return, market volatility, organization return, partnership return, process return, production equipment return, product return, real option return, shareholder return, technology return, vendor return, vendor relationship return, alliance value, brand value, channel value, content value, contingent liabilities, customer value, customer relationship value, current operation value, derivative value, employee value, employee relationship value, enterprise value, external factor value, event value, information technology value, intellectual property value, investment value, knowledge value, market sentiment value, market value, market volatility, organization value, partnership value, process value, production equipment value, product value, real option value, technology value, vendor value, vendor relationship value and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         85 . The software architecture of  claim 83  where a subset of the organization is defined by attributes selected from the group consisting of context layers, organization levels, organizations and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         86 . The software architecture of  claim 83  where a common application within a set of common applications is selected from the group consisting of an application for analyzing the impact of user specified changes on a defined organization subset, an application for forecasting the value of a specified variable using context layer data for a specified defined organization subset, an application for simulating organization performance and identifying the optimal mode for operating a defined organization subset for one or more measures, an application for establishing expected levels and priorities for actions, events and measures for a defined organization subset, an application for developing action, element, impact, measure performance and risk reports in standard formats for a defined organization subset, an application that analyzes the impact of a project or a group of projects on a defined organization subset and determines the feature set that will optimize the impact of the project or group of projects on said defined organization subset and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         87 . A data method, comprising:
 integrating organization data in accordance with an organization context model, and   using said model to develop an organization ontology that supports the management and optimization of performance for one or more quantitative measures for any subset of the organization using a set of common applications.   
     
     
         88 . The method of  claim 87  where the ontology is developed by learning from the data. 
     
     
         89 . The model of  claim 87  where organization context further comprises one or more context layers where the layers are selected from the group consisting of physical, tactical, instant impact, organization, mission, social environment and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         90 . The model of  claim 87  where the ingredients driving quantitative measure performance are selected from the group consisting of elements of performance, projects, resources, risks, social environment factors and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         91 . The model of  claim 87  where elements of performance are selected from the group consisting of alliances, brands, capital, channels, customers, customer relationships, employees, employee relationships, human capital, intellectual property, inventory, investors, investor relationships, knowledge, partners, partner relationships, processes, products, suppliers, supplier relationships, support chains, visitors, the workforce, workforce time and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         92 . The model of  claim 87  where social environment factors are selected from the group consisting of numerical indicators of conditions external to the organization, numerical indications of prices external to the organization, numerical indications of organization conditions compared to external expectations of organization condition, numerical indications of the organization performance compared to external expectations of organization performance and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         93 . The model of  claim 87  where risks are selected from the group consisting of factor variability risks, element variability risks, base market risk, industry market risk, market volatility, strategic event risks, extreme event risks, event risks, contingent liabilities and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         94 . The model of  claim 87  that supports developing and aligning measures by organization level in an automated fashion. 
     
     
         95 . A database that provides access to organization related data by context layer in accordance with one or more organization contexts. 
     
     
         96 . The database of  claim 95  that further comprises a datamart, a data warehouse, a storage area network or a virtual database. 
     
     
         97 . The database of  claim 95  where the context layers are selected from the group consisting of physical, tactical, instant impact, organization, mission, social environment and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         98 . The database of  claim 95  where the one or more organization contexts are defined by context frames. 
     
     
         99 . An architecture for use in designing, deploying, and managing a plurality of applications on a distributed computing system for an organization, the architecture comprising: a plurality of layers where at least one layer is an application layer
 where a single set of common applications resident in the application layer manage a performance of any subset of the organization for a complete context,   where the architecture enables an optimization of any subset of the organization for a complete context,   where said complete context for an organization subset comprises the context from  claim 111  with one or more quantitative measures for evaluating performance, and   where the common applications incorporate an analysis of the network effect of a plurality of risks, external factors and elements of value on one or more performance measures and are selected from the group consisting of analysis, forecast, optimization, planning, project management, review, transaction and combinations thereof.   
     
     
         100 . The software architecture of  claim 99  where a quantitative measure is selected from the group consisting of alliance risk, brand risk, channel risk, content risk, contingent liabilities, customer risk, customer relationship risk, current operation risk, derivative risk, employee risk, employee relationship risk, energy risk, enterprise risk, external factor risk, event risk, fraud risk, information technology risk, total return, intellectual property risk, investment risk, knowledge risk, market sentiment risk, market risk, market volatility, organization risk, partnership risk, process risk, production equipment risk, product risk, real option risk, technology risk, vendor risk, vendor relationship risk, weather risk, revenue, expense, capital change, alliance return, brand return, channel return, content return, customer return, customer relationship return, current operation return, derivative return, employee return, employee relationship return, enterprise return, external factor return, event return, information technology return, intellectual property return, investment return, knowledge return, market sentiment return, market return, market volatility, organization return, partnership return, process return, production equipment return, product return, real option return, shareholder return, technology return, vendor return, vendor relationship return, alliance value, brand value, channel value, content value, contingent liabilities, customer value, customer relationship value, current operation value, derivative value, employee value, employee relationship value, enterprise value, external factor value, event value, information technology value, intellectual property value, investment value, knowledge value, market sentiment value, market value, market volatility, organization value, partnership value, process value, production equipment value, product value, real option value, technology value, vendor value, vendor relationship value and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         101 . The software architecture of  claim 99 , wherein a subset of the organization is defined by attributes selected from the group consisting of context layers, organization levels, organizations and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         102 . The software architecture of  claim 99 , wherein a common application within a set of common applications is selected from the group consisting of an application for analyzing the impact of user specified changes on a defined organization subset, an application for forecasting the value of a specified variable using context layer data for a specified defined organization subset, an application for simulating organization performance and identifying the optimal mode for operating a defined organization subset for one or more measures, an application for establishing expected levels and priorities for actions, events and measures for a defined organization subset, an application for developing action, element, impact, measure performance and risk reports in standard formats for a defined organization subset, an application that analyzes the impact of a project or a group of projects on a defined organization subset and determines the feature set that will optimize the impact of the project or group of projects on said defined organization subset and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         103 . An architecture for context aware computing, the architecture comprising:
 a data access layer operable to exchange data with a plurality of systems and to present the data to a context modeling layer through a uniform interface;   a context modeling layer operable to develop a context from the data obtained from the data object access layer and to present the context to a frame layer through a uniform interface;   a frame layer operable to obtain a perspective from a user interface and to develop a context frame which provides a context for the perspective to an application in a uniform format, and   an application layer that contains one or more applications that use said context frame to complete one or more useful context-aware functions.   
     
     
         104 . The architecture of  claim 103 , wherein one or more applications are selected from the group consisting of analysis, forecast, optimization, planning, project management, review, transaction and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         105 . A computer program product embodied on a computer readable medium and comprising program code for directing at least one computer to complete processing in accordance with an architecture for context aware computing, comprising:
 a data access layer operable to exchange data with a plurality of systems and to present the data to a context modeling layer through a uniform interface;   a context modeling layer operable to develop a context from the data obtained from the data access layer and to present the context to a frame layer through a uniform interface;   a frame layer operable to obtain a perspective from a user interface and to develop a context frame which provides a context for the perspective to a plurality of applications in a uniform format, and   an application layer that contains one or more applications that use said context frame to complete one or more useful context-aware functions
 where a context further comprises a complete context that contains information that defines an impact of changes in operation on a long term performance measure, information that defines a social environment context and information selected from the group consisting of information that defines a tactical context, information that defines a physical context, information that defines a measure context and combinations thereof. 
   
     
     
         106 . The computer program product of  claim 105 , wherein one or more applications are selected from the group consisting of analysis, forecast, optimization, planning, project management, review, transaction and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         107 . The computer program product of  claim 105 , wherein a plurality of systems are selected from the group consisting of accounting systems, alliance management systems, asset management systems, brand management systems, budgeting/financial planning systems, business intelligence systems, call management systems, cash management systems, channel management systems, commodity risk management systems, content management systems, contract management systems, credit-risk management system, customer relationship management systems, data integration systems, demand chain systems, decision support systems, document management systems, email management systems, employee relationship management systems, energy risk management systems, executive dashboard systems, expense report processing systems, fleet management systems, fraud management systems, freight management systems, human capital management systems, human resource management systems, incentive management systems, innovation management systems, insurance management systems, intellectual property management systems, intelligent storage systems, interest rate risk management systems, investor relationship management systems, knowledge management systems, learning management systems, location management systems, maintenance management systems, material requirement planning systems, metrics creation system, online analytical processing systems, ontology management systems, partner relationship management systems, payroll systems, performance management systems, price optimization systems, private exchanges, process management systems, product life-cycle management systems, project management systems, project portfolio management systems, revenue management systems, risk management information system, risk simulation systems, sales force automation systems, scorecard systems, sensor grid systems, service management systems, six-sigma quality management systems, strategic planning systems, supply chain systems, supplier relationship management systems, support chain systems, taxonomy development systems, technology chain systems, unstructured data management systems, visitor (web site) relationship management systems, weather risk management systems, workforce management systems, yield management systems and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         108 . The computer program product of  claim 105  that further comprises a plurality of intelligent agents. 
     
     
         109 . An architecture for context aware applications, comprising an application layer with:
 a data access function operable to exchange data with a plurality of systems and to present the data to a context modeling function through a uniform interface;   a context modeling function operable to develop a context from the data obtained from the data access function and to present the context to a frame function through a uniform interface;   a frame function operable to obtain a perspective from a user interface and to develop a context frame which provides a context for the perspective to a plurality of application in a uniform format, and   one or more applications that uses said context frame to complete one or more useful context-aware functions.   
     
     
         110 . The application layer of  claim 109 , wherein one or more applications are selected from the group consisting of analysis, forecast, optimization, planning, project management, review, transaction and combinations thereof. 
     
     
         111 . A computer program product embodied on a computer readable medium and comprising program code for directing at least one computer to complete processing in accordance with an architecture for context aware computing, comprising an application layer with:
 a data access function operable to exchange data with a plurality of systems and to present the data to a context modeling function through a uniform interface;   a context modeling function operable to develop a context from the data obtained from the data access layer and to present the context to a frame function through a uniform interface;   a frame function operable to obtain a perspective from a user interface and to develop a context frame which provides a context for the perspective to a plurality of applications in a uniform format, and   one or more applications that use said context frame to complete one or more useful context-aware functions.
 where a context further comprises a complete context that contains information that defines an impact of changes in operation on a short term performance measure, information that defines a social environment context and information selected from the group consisting of information that defines a tactical context, information that defines a physical context, information that defines a measure context and combinations thereof. 
   
     
     
         112 . The computer program product of  claim 111 , wherein one or more applications are selected from the group consisting of analysis, forecast, optimization, planning, project management, review, transaction and combinations thereof.