IBM BPM, V8.0.1, All platforms > Get started with IBM BPM > Key concepts > BPEL processes and human tasks
Human tasks Overview
A human task is a component that allows people and services to interact.
Some human tasks represent to dos for people. These tasks can be initiated either by a person or by an automated service. Human tasks can be used to implement activities in BPEL processes that require human interactions, such as manual exception handling and approvals. Other human tasks can be used to invoke a service, or to coordinate the collaboration between people. However, regardless of how a task is initiated, a person from a group of people, to which the task is assigned, performs the work associated with the task.
People are assigned to human tasks either statically, or by specifying criteria, such as a role or a group, that are resolved at run time using a people directory. Alternatively the input data of a human task, or the data of a BPEL process is used to find the right people to work on a task.
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