What You Need to Know to Be Rules-Based
Rules in Business and Government
Your Guide to Real-World Rules
This book is about rules for groups and communities of people (including their data). The goal? Shaping behavior and communicating business knowledge, not simply mimicking human intelligence. It’s exactly what you need for governance, traceability, and the human touch so often missing in digital solutions.
About Rules
Rules are not actions and not processes. Nor are they instructions or commands. Rules are something else, something special.
Confusion abounds about what rules are. What makes a statement special when you call it a rule? What restrictions does that place on how the statement is expressed? What special opportunities does it raise? These are crucial questions, some of the most fundamental you can ask.
Time for a fresh look. Rules are almost certainly not what you think they are. And that lack of understanding is holding us back.
“For the longest time I’ve been encouraged by family, friends and colleagues to write down everything I’ve learned about rules over a lifetime of hands-on consulting, research, and standards work. So, I did. This book is the result. It accurately distills much of what I’ve learned about rules in what is hopefully highly readable form. I believe you’ll benefit from it, no matter what your professional orientation. We literally all have rules in common!”
Who Is This Book For?
- Policy Maker
- Policy Advisor
- Policy Interpreter
- Legislative Drafter
- Rule Maker
- Regulator
- Compliance Officer
- Legal Staff
- Contract Drafter
- Auditor
- Risk Analyst
- Decision Modeler
- Rule Analyst
- Business Analyst
- Requirements Engineer
- Product Owner
- Data Quality Professional
- Data Governance Professional
- Business Process Manager
- Business Process Analyst
- Business System Analyst
- Business Software Developer
If your role or responsibility involves one or more of the above, you’ll find a treasure trove of practical ideas in this book you can apply in your daily responsibilities.
Being rule-based is the most basic characteristic of Western civilization. If you want to deeply understand rules, look no further. Here’s how to be rule-based about anything involving groups and communities of people, including their knowledge!
This Book Will Show You How To:
- Create better rules
- Insert sentiment, human discretion, and common sense into real-time business activity
- Express data constraints in natural language
- Distinguish rules and requirements
- Chose the right form to express rules and guidance
- Communicate guidance clearly and completely
- Identify defects in rules
- Reduce ambiguity in all forms of guidance
- Treat exceptions to rules
- Handle violations of rules
- Interpret policy into practicable rules ready to deploy
- Bridge the gap between laws, regulations, and contracts — and automation
- Address problems in data quality
- Disseminate knowledge in real time
- Improve your governance processes
What early readers are saying.
… essential reading for anyone involved in business change; crucial for anyone undertaking business analysis.
… reminds us about the importance of clear rules and policies for any organization caring about people experience across its processes.
… groundwork for an engineered way of communication between business experts and developers that allows knowledge to be shared at the right level.
… a must read for any governance professional.
… concise and to the point, accessible for many disciplines and relevant to a large public. I highly recommend it.
By capturing and interpreting rules, I always feel we understand things deeply and clearly.
… should be well-thumbed, annotated in the margins, and full of sticky notes. Get it, internalize it, act on it.
... a nice, clear read. Stresses the importance of (good) behavioral rules, proper automation, and direct support for violations.
… engaging style. Recommended reading for legislative drafters. Remarkable the main textbooks don't really deal with how rules work.
… your go-to book for understanding rules and all the ways we can use them in the world around us.
… how to move business rules from unclear and ill-considered diktats to thought-through and clear boundaries that promote freedom.
… lighthearted and fun, but still potent. Why has this crucial message not been getting through to people?!
Every analyst writing a definition, constraint, rule, or guideline should learn from Ron's guidance. The result is easy to understand and follow.
… explains rules in clear, accessible language, along with their place in the landscape of business concept modeling and ontologies.
The combination of perspectives is absolutely outstanding.
Full of valuable insights and practical advice not only for people new to the topic, but also for seasoned experts.
Part I · About Rules
- 1What Rules Do for Us
- 2What Rules Are
- 3The Two Fundamental Kinds of Rules
- 4About Violations of Behavioral Rules
- 5About Definitional Rules: What Counts?
Part II · Expressing Rules
- 1Being Practicable
- 2Being Declarative
- 3Being Factual
- 4Being Complete
- 5Being Unambiguous
Part III · Analyzing Rules
- 1Discovery of Rules
- 2Discovery of Flash Points
- 3Discovery of Messages
Part IV · Rule Quality
- 1Exceptions
- 2Anomalies
- 3Knock-Out Rules
Part V · Permissions, Authorizations, and Rights
- 1Permissions
- 2Authorizations
- 3Rights
Appendices
- AAConcept Model Diagram for Factual Expression of Rules
- ABEnsuring Logical Consistency of Guidance
- ACAbout Decision Tables
- ADA Word About ‘Decision’
- AEConcept Models and Their Representation
- AFModalities: Forms of Guidance
- AGPositive Reinforcement and Rewards
- AHSample Enforcement Levels for Behavioral Rules
- AIWarranties
- AJUsage Constraints for Applicability Conditions
- AKWhy Not Use IF-THEN Syntax
- ALThe Relationship of Facts and Data
- AMStructural Forms of Expression for Rules
- ANUse of ‘WHEN’
- AOFlash Points and Definitional Rules
- APEliminating Programmer Workload for Rules
- AQDefinitions, Rules, and Logical Implications
Ronald G. Ross is Co-Founder, Business Rule Solutions, LLC.
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