Workflow concept

A workflow is a series of predefined steps that reflect your work progress and helps users manage the work they do on assets.

Introduction

Workflows indicate the progress of a task or the status of an asset. They are a universal tool available for all asset types. For example, workflows can help users to have control over an approval or publishing process. A workflow could correspond to the creation, review, and approval stages that assets must go through before they are published.

Workflows consist of three elements – steps, states and targets. For each workflow, a sequence of workflow steps and workflow states are defined and assigned to a workflow target, that is, a specific user or user group.

Workflows

Workflows can be defined according to different processes for different types of assets. censhare comes with these preconfigured workflows:

• Product - for the production lifecycle of products, product items, product families, and classifications

• Media - for the production lifecycle of images, videos, etc

• Content - for the production lifecycle of text content

censhare administrators or users with the relevant permissions, can create further workflows that are relevant for the business processes in their organization. There can be specific workflows for certain asset types. 

Workflows can be assigned to any asset type. Depending on the system configuration, a workflow can be assigned automatically, for example when an asset is created. By default, no workflow is assigned to an asset. If not otherwise specified, users can also select workflows individually.

Approval workflow

Besides the custom workflows that are available in your system, censhare provides a simple approval workflow that is available in the default configuration. This workflow is associated with the Approval task in the task management.

Workflow steps

Workflow steps represent steps and transitions in a determined workflow. For example, an Article asset transits from created, in progress, in review, approval to finished.

Workflow states

Workflow states reflect the workflow status in a more generic way. Different workflows with different steps can be mapped to the same workflow states. Workflow states give a fast overview of the status of a workflow. They describe global, system-wide, domain-independent productions phases that serve two purposes:

• detailed regulation of the user permissions according to workflow steps

• the visualization of hierarchical status dependencies

Workflow states cannot be selected, they are set automatically in conformance with the workflow step. Users select a workflow step when an asset has been assigned to them. The corresponding workflow state then allows, for example, a project manager monitors the overall state of the project.

Workflow targets

Each workflow step can be assigned to a default target. This ensures that an asset in a workflow is never unassigned. The workflow target can be a user or a group. When an assigned user completes a workflow step, the asset passes to the next workflow step and is automatically assigned to the default user. If not otherwise specified, users can also assign workflow targets individually.

Workflow management

For the different work areas and domains, censhare provides preconfigured workflows. The workflow steps are mapped to the common workflow states as shown in the following table:

Use these workflows for product assets, media assets or content assets, as well as for campaigns and projects.

System developers and administrators can customize workflows and workflow steps to the need of their organizations. See Create custom workflows.