Overview
A process template is the blueprint of how a business process gets done in your organization. Users in your organization can use process templates (usually designed by people with Administrative privileges).
Users with Administrative privileges can create and manage Process Templates by selecting Process Templates menu option in Administration menu dropdown as shown below. You will see the list of existing process templates as shown below.
Creating a New Process Template
Administrators can create new process templates by selecting “New” button as shown below the list of process templates
The next step is define various aspects of the process template as shown in the picture below
Once appropriate selections for the process template are made you can select Save button to save the process template.
The next steps show below define the key elements of the process template.
Process Roles
Once the template is saved the next step is to define roles. While optional, defining process roles is a good practice to give clarity to who performs specific activities of the process workflow. Process roles can be defined by selecting a selecting a process template from the list and clicking “Roles” button.
Participant and Process Admin are default roles. Process Admin role is like an admin for the process instance with privileges to start/stop process instances, complete all the activities and make changes to running process workflow instances.
In addition to the standard roles, new roles can be created for the process workflow with authorization to perform certain actions in the context of the process.
You can create a new process role by selecting “New” button at the bottom. The following form for creating a new process role will be displayed.
After entering name, description and selecting allowed process actions for the role, you can select “Save” button to create the new process role. In a similar fashion you can create additional process roles that are relevant for the process.
Process Members
The next step is to assign members to the process. You can also do this after defining the process workflow. Select the process template and click the button Members as shown in the figure below.
The members and their roles for the process will be listed as shown below. You can add users as member to the workflow or invite new users (to the Z Flow and these users are added as guests from a system role perspective) to the process. For advanced workflow templates Z Flow also allows addition of groups and organization positions as members of a process workflow.
Process Workflow
The key aspect of process template is the workflow that is defined as a set of ordered process activities (can also done in parallel) that are performed by process members or process roles. To review of create Workflow select the process template and click the “Workflow” tab as shown in the figure below.
Processes are made up of set of activities that are performed by different roles and/or members. The order in which the activities are performed is the order listed in the workflow. Performers of workflow activities can roles and/or members added to the process template. A new activity can be added to the workflow by selecting the New Button.
New activities can be created and existing activities can be edited or deleted. In addition, the order of the workflow activities can be changed by using “Arrange Activities” function. You can also assign individual users as performers of activities using “Assign Performers“.
Once all the workflow activities are defined the template can be saved. The template still needs to be made “Effective” before it can be used to create workflow instances based on the template.