Modeling objects and events
Object-centric modeling is the foundation of how Celonis understands and analyzes processes. By modeling objects (like orders, invoices, or deliveries) and events (the activities that happen to them over time), you give Celonis the structure it needs to uncover process flows, dependencies, and performance insights across your data.
Whether you’re just getting started or refining an existing model, the topics below will help you understand the core ideas and put them into practice:
Objects
Objects represent real-world business entities that participate in processes, such as orders, invoices, customers, deliveries, or employees. Objects form the structural backbone of object-centric process mining (OCPM) by defining what a process acts on. Each object belongs to an object type, which defines how the object is uniquely identified, which attributes describe it, and how it relates to events and other objects. When you create an object type and populate it through transformations, Celonis creates one object instance for each unique object ID found in the source data.
To learn more about creating and modeling objects, see: Objects.
Events
Events represent actions related to business entities, such as orders being created, invoices paid, or deliveries shipped. Events form the chronological backbone of process mining by capturing what happens and when. Each event belongs to an event type, which defines its identifier, attributes, and links to objects and other events. Celonis creates one event instance for each unique row in the source data.
To learn more about creating and modeling events, see: Events
Transformations
Custom transformations take your extracted business data and map it into Celonis so that objects, events, and relationships can be used in analyses. They can include scripts for object and event attributes, many-to-many relationships, and (for objects only) changes to object attributes over time. These transformations ensure that your extracted business data is structured correctly so Celonis features and analyses can use it effectively.
To learn more about creating and running transformations, see: Transformations.
Perspectives
A perspective is a way to look at your process data from a specific angle. It shows which object types (for example, Purchase Orders or Vendors), event types (such as Order Created or Invoice Paid), and the relationships between them are included in the analysis. Perspectives help you focus on the part of the process that matters for your question, without changing the underlying data model. This makes it easier to analyze complex processes that involve multiple objects.
To learn more about creating and using perspectives, see: Perspectives.