8 Great Workflow Examples | Project Workflow Process Examples
Jonathan D. Rhyne
How Can I Use Workflow Examples?
Workflow examples like those provided below give you an idea of what’s possible with process design and workflow management software.
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Get ideas for improving your existing workflows.
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Find areas of the business that could use workflow.
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Educate stakeholders on the importance of efficient workflow.
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Tie processes to company objectives.
We’ve found that once people see a few good examples, the workflow ideas start pouring out. Review the workflow examples below and whip out your favorite workflow diagram software to start sketching out your ideas.
We also provide pre-built process apps to our customers for rapid prototyping and deployment. These pre-built apps can easily be downloaded by customers and imported into Nutrient Workflow.
Download our List of Workflow Examples and Use Cases (PDF)
Incident Response
A wide variety of incident response processes can be automated, for example, cybersecurity breaches, internal non-compliance or whistle-blowing, safety issues, etc. We’ve talked about handling cybersecurity breaches so let’s use that as an example. A reported incident is initially evaluated by a front-line team that assesses the situation, severity, etc., and decides if it should be sent to an assignee (for instance, the department head) for review. The department head may simply file the incident or pass it to the remediation team to handle it. Once the remediation team solves the issue, the solution is reviewed by the designated executive, who needs to approve the solution or reject it. Once a solution is accepted and implemented, the Reporting Compliance team documents the entire incident and resolution. More about Incident Management.
New IT Projects
IT Projects are discreet efforts to solve a business problem within a specific timeline. Without an organized, formal method for intake, requests for IT projects can quickly become wasteful and overwhelming.
IT departments use workflow management to provide a framework and process for submitting, reviewing, approving, assigning, and tracking IT project requests. On the right is a simplified process flow for an IT project request.
In the rudimentary example on the right, an IT project request is assigned to a first approver (their manager). If not approved, it’s returned to the submitter with a notification. If their manager approves it, it proceeds to IT. If accepted, the process ends. If rejected, it’s returned to the submitter.
Capital Expenditure (CapEx) Requests
Improperly tracking and evaluating capital expenditure requests is one of the top issues preventing CapEx programs’ success. Workflow automation plays a pivotal role early in the CapEx process by providing a consistent, compliant, measurable method for managing CapEx requests.
In the simple diagram on the right, you can see the process initiated with an employee completing a form designed to capture all the required data points to initiate a capital expenditure request. Once approved by their department manager, the request is passed through a basic business rule regarding the size of the request. Based on the rule, the assignee is the appropriate Finance approver.
Once the request is approved, the requestor is notified, the data is passed to the accounting system and this part of the process ends or continues to Purchasing, etc.
New Hire/Onboarding Workflows
Every step of the new hire process is important, starting with the initial intake of a new employee. The process needs to be seamless and compliant with organizational and legal requirements.
The simple example on the right shows the early part of a new hire process. Typically this process requires a great deal of back-and-forth between stakeholders. An automated workflow triggers notifications and approvals as steps are completed, avoiding manual emails, phone calls, and check-ins.
In this process, the I-9 form triggers a separate path if the applicant is a re-hire, bypassing the background check process in favor of an internal check.
The applicant continues through the standard background check protocol if it’s a new hire. Based on the background check results, a notification may be sent to the hiring manager (and/or another stakeholder). A separate process might handle this situation.
Suppose the applicant passes either the re-hire check or the background check. In that case, they continue and receive an offer letter (based on the hiring manager’s initial submitted information), and a starting date is scheduled.
At this point, other processes would begin, for instance, hardware acquisition, space allocation, benefits information being sent, etc.
Job Change of Status Requests
In larger organizations with multiple management layers, job changes require the input of several different stakeholders before being approved. In this example, there are no less than six levels of approval before an employee can officially start a new role.
In an automated workflow, each step in the process happens as the previous approval is acquired. Along the way, the employee can see where the request is in the process and whose approval is next (if this kind of transparency is desired).
Approval can be as simple as reviewing the information in a company portal and choosing to approve it or clicking on an “Approval” link in an email.
The entire process is tracked for reporting later. This allows HR personnel to see if there is a bottleneck in the process regularly. For instance, trend data may indicate that requests tend to stick with the GM for an unacceptably long period. The situation can then be addressed with the GM (or an alternate route could be implemented).
This reporting/trending element of automation becomes critical for organizations looking to improve upon their business processes over time.
Contract Approvals
An improperly-approved contract can be a nightmare. Depending on the term, it can remain a nightmare for years. Companies can avoid legal and financial headaches by building workflows to vet contracts according to organizational business rules.
The example here shows that the department head must sign off on a contract before being vetted by finance. If Finance believes it to be within budget and acceptable, they pass it on to Legal for review. Depending on the type of contract, it may route to a different legal team. Once Legal has approved it (asking for changes as needed), the original PDF is stored in the Contract Database, and the process ends.
Support Requests
In a small organization, a phone call to Ray in IT can usually resolve IT support issues fairly efficiently. In larger organizations, an IT support request system is required. Workflow management is the backbone of these systems. Advanced rules can route requests based on type, severity, department, etc. Users can track their requests and IT managers can report on performance. On the right is a simplified example of an IT request workflow.
Marketing Collateral Requests
Whether you’re managing a handful of marketing collateral requests daily or running a brand management portal like some of our clients, an automated process for handling marketing requests is extremely helpful. Providing sales, channel management, field marketing employees, etc. with one-stop shopping for marketing content is user-friendly and gives the marketing team a consistent, automated, auditable process.
Additional Examples
Looking for even more examples? We have more on our Help site.
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Jonathan joined Nutrient in 2014. As CEO, Jonathan defines the company’s vision and strategic goals, bolsters the team culture, and steers product direction. When he’s not working, he enjoys being a dad, photography, and soccer.
