Activity working time

Activity working time and service time

Activity working time is the time it takes to perform an activity without interruptions: the time spent purely on performing the activity.

Service time is the time it takes to perform an activity including the interruptions, idle (unproductive) time, and the time spent working on other tasks in the meantime.

Illustration of activity working time

The value of activity working time is always less than or equal to the service time.

The service time of a robot is equal to its working time, as no interruptions occur during the robotic activities.

Because working time for an activity might vary over time, you can define the date until which the specified working time must be applied to the activity.

Best practices in defining activity working time

In IBM Process Mining, you can define activity working time that is used for cost calculation by using two complementary sources:
Primary source: Measured activity working time provided in the dataset (event-level)

If you provided measured activity working time in the dataset at event level, it is considered as the primary input for cost calculation. You can map activity working time for each activity when creating a process in IBM Process Mining. For more information, see Event log.

Conceptually, measured activity working time represents the actual net execution effort spent to perform a specific activity instance.

Typical and valid sources for measured activity working time include:
  • Task Mining, where active work time is captured from user interactions
  • Jira or similar tools, where employees explicitly track time spent on activities
  • BPM / workflow engines, where the information includes accurate “work start / work end” values which exclude idle time
Key characteristics of measured activity working time:
  • Activity working time can vary per event
  • Cost reflects real execution variability
  • Best suited for descriptive or bottom‑up cost analysis
Secondary source: Configured activity working time defined at activity configuration level

To set a configured activity working time, go to Data & Settings > Cost settings > Activity working time tab and define a fixed duration per activity (optionally by activity type such as manual or automatic).

Conceptually, configured activity working time represents the standard or expected execution effort for an activity, independent of instance‑level variability.

Key characteristics of configured activity working time:
  • Stable and intentional
  • Based on Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) knowledge, Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs), design assumptions, or target operating models
These approaches are designed to work together. IBM Process Mining applies the following automatic fallback mechanism:
  • If a measured activity working time on the event level is present in the dataset → it is used as the primary source.
  • If a working time attribute is configured in the Attributes settings and the value is NULL or 0 for a specific event → IBM Process Mining automatically falls back to the configured activity working time from the Cost settings.

    No additional configuration or custom logic is required to enable this behavior. It serves to ensure maximum accuracy where execution effort is measured, full cost coverage even when measurements are partial or unavailable, and consistent and predictable cost calculations.

  • If no measured activity working time on the event level is present in the dataset → IBM Process Mining automatically falls back to the configured activity working time.
Important: The automatic fallback mechanism from working time attribute to cost settings is only available when working time is configured through the Attributes settings (Data & Settings > Data > Attributes). When working time is mapped directly in the event log data source during project creation, the fallback does not apply. This makes the event log mapping option more limited in scenarios where partial working time data is available. For maximum flexibility and automatic cost coverage, configure working time as an attribute rather than mapping it in the event log.

Adding activity working time

  1. Open a project.
  2. Go to Data & Settings > Cost Settings > Activity working time.
  3. Click Add default activity working time.
  4. In the Add default activity working time dialog, do the following steps:
    1. In the Activity field, select the activity for which you want to add a value.
    2. b. In the Value field, define the value of working time for this activity.
      Note: The maximum value that you can define in the Hours field is 23. Likewise, the maximum value that you can set in the Minutes field is 59.
    3. In the Type field, select the activity type as Automatic, Manual, or Any.
    4. In the End date field, select the date which the system must consider the end of the activity working time.

  5. Click Add and apply your changes.

Editing an activity working time value

  1. Open a project.
  2. Go to Data & Settings > Cost Settings > Activity working time.
  3. Click Edit next to the activity that you want to edit.
  4. In the Edit default activity working time dialog, update the values.
    Note: In the Edit default activity working time dialog, you can update only the Value, Type, and End Date. You cannot change the activity.
  5. Save and apply your changes.

Defining a default working time for all activities

  1. Open a project.
  2. Go to Data & Settings > Cost Settings > Activity working time.
  3. Click Edit next to the default activity working time.
  4. In the Edit default activity working time dialog, do the following steps:
    1. In the Value field, define the value of working time for this activity.
      Note: The maximum value that you can define in the Hours field is 23. Likewise, the maximum value that you can set in the Minutes field is 59.
    2. In the Type field, select the type as Automatic, Manual, or Any.
    3. In the End date field, select the date which the system must consider the end of the activity working time.

  5. Save and apply your changes.

Deleting an activity working time value

  1. Open a project.
  2. Go to Data & Settings > Cost Settings > Activity working time.
  3. Click Delete next to the activity working time that you want to delete.
  4. Confirm that you want to delete this activity working time.
  5. Apply your changes.

Editing the data source mapping

You can edit the data mapping from the Activity working time page, if you need to change how the activity working time was mapped.

  1. In the Activity working time page, click the information button next to the message that informs whether you mapped activity working time in your project.
  2. Click Edit data mapping.
  3. In the Create a process-mining project dialog, make the necessary changes.
  4. Save your changes.