Agentic Business Process Management: A Research Manifesto

2026-03-19

AI Summary

This work proposes Agentive Process Management (APM), a novel paradigm addressing the limitations of traditional business process management in governing autonomous agents. By integrating process-aware and agent-oriented abstractions, APM enables software, hardware, and human agents to collaboratively perceive, reason, and act within well-defined process frameworks. The core innovation lies in four key capabilities—framed autonomy, explainability, dialogic operability, and self-modification—that dynamically align individual agent behaviors with organizational objectives. Bridging business process management, artificial intelligence, and multi-agent systems, this research establishes an architectural and conceptual foundation for autonomous collaboration, offering both a theoretical framework and a roadmap for future interdisciplinary research and practical implementation.

Technology Category

• Multiagent Systems: Agent/AI Theories and Architectures
• Cognitive Modeling & Cognitive Systems: Agent Architectures
• Humans and AI: Human-Aware Planning and Behavior Prediction

Application Category

• Responsible Web: Machine-in-the-loop, human agency and autonomy
• Semantics and Knowledge: Data modeling to support human-machine intelligence, including LLMs agents, intelligent system behavior, explanations, and user-friendly interactions
• Search and Retrieval-Augmented AI: Agentic search

Abstract

This paper presents a manifesto that articulates the conceptual foundations of Agentic Business Process Management (APM), an extension of Business Process Management (BPM) for governing autonomous agents executing processes in organizations. From a management perspective, APM represents a paradigm shift from the traditional process view of the business process, driven by the realization of process awareness and an agent-oriented abstraction, where software and human agents act as primary functional entities that perceive, reason, and act within explicit process frames. This perspective marks a shift from traditional, automation-oriented BPM toward systems in which autonomy is constrained, aligned, and made operational through process awareness. We introduce the core abstractions and architectural elements required to realize APM systems and elaborate on four key capabilities that such APM agents must support: framed autonomy, explainability, conversational actionability, and self-modification. These capabilities jointly ensure that agents' goals are aligned with organizational goals and that agents behave in a framed yet proactive manner in pursuing those goals. We discuss the extent to which the capabilities can be realized and identify research challenges whose resolution requires further advances in BPM, AI, and multi-agent systems. The manifesto thus serves as a roadmap for bridging these communities and for guiding the development of APM systems in practice.

Problem

• Agentic Business Process Management
• autonomous agents
• process awareness
• framed autonomy
• organizational alignment

Innovation

• Agentic BPM
• Framed Autonomy
• Process Awareness
• Explainability
• Self-Modification