It's like a flow chart but each steps being assigned to an owner or department. Swimlane refers to how each lane is meant for each owner (like olympics swimming competition, one lane per swimmer.)
Anyways a picture is worth a thousand words so here, this explains better: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swim_lane
Anyways a picture is worth a thousand words so here, this explains better: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swim_lane
