How to Create and Test a Workflow

Creating a workflow in Willow360 is a powerful way to automate and streamline your approach to document processing. However, before sharing your workflow with others, it’s crucial to ensure it functions correctly and respects privacy and permissions. This article will guide you through the best practices for creating, testing, and securing your workflow.

Step 1: Define Your Workflow Objectives

Before diving into the creation process, clearly define what you want your workflow to achieve. Identify the tasks that need automation, the sequence of actions, and the desired outcomes. This clarity will help you design a workflow that meets your specific needs.

Step 2: Create the Workflow

Access Willow360: Log in to your Willow360 account and navigate to the workflow creation section.

Start a New Workflow: Click on the option to create a new workflow. Give your workflow a descriptive name that reflects its purpose.

Add Actions: Workflows in Willow360 are built from actions. Add the actions your process requires. These are grouped by purpose:

Flow control: Approve, Custom Task

Signing: WillowSign, Simple Sign, Auto Sign, Digital Certificate

Data collection: Fill in a Form, Supply Information, AI Data, External Data

Document modification: Convert to PDF, Stamp, Watermark, Highlight, Redact, Rename

Rearrangement: Merge, Split, Create Booklet, Divide Booklet

Export and distribution: Upload to SharePoint, Upload to OneDrive, Upload to Google Drive, Upload to Dropbox, Secure Email, System Email, Export Data to CSV

Step 3: Configure Each Action

For each action, configure the necessary settings. For example, if you are using the Approve action, specify who the approvers are and whether any one approver or all approvers must respond. If you are using an Upload to Cloud action, select the destination folder and configure subfolder or naming rules as needed.

If your workflow needs to extract information from documents automatically, add the AI Data action and configure a query for each piece of data you want to capture. AI Data uses OCR combined with artificial intelligence to read values directly from document content, such as invoice totals, supplier names, dates, or whether a document has been signed, without any manual input.

If you want the workflow to build a running report of processed files, add the Export Data to CSV action and configure the columns and cloud destination for the output file.

Step 4: Set Permissions and Privacy

Define Permissions: Willow360 allows you to control who can use, view, and edit each workflow. There are three levels of access:

Can use workflow: the user can add files to the workflow
Can see all files: in addition to the above, the user can view files added by other users
Can edit workflow: in addition to the above, the user can modify the workflow settings and actions

Users with no permission assigned will not see the workflow tile and cannot add files to it.

Assign Roles: Assign these permissions to individual users, teams, or everyone in your organisation. Individual permissions override team permissions, which override permissions set for everyone.

Privacy Considerations: Ensure that sensitive information is protected. Use the Digital Certificate action to confirm document authenticity and integrity, and the Redact action to permanently obscure confidential content before sharing.

Step 5: Test the Workflow

Before granting access to others, thoroughly test your workflow to ensure it functions as expected.

Add Test Files: Upload a few test files to the workflow and monitor how they progress through each action.

Check Notifications: Ensure that notifications are sent correctly for actions such as approvals and task assignments.

Verify Outputs: Check the final outputs, such as converted PDFs, signed documents, files uploaded to cloud services, and any CSV reports generated.

Simulate Errors: Intentionally introduce edge cases (for example incorrect file formats) to see how the workflow handles them and ensure any error notifications are clear.

Step 6: Review and Refine

Based on your testing, make any necessary adjustments to the workflow. This might include reconfiguring actions, changing permissions, or adding additional steps to handle edge cases.

Step 7: Grant Access

Once you are confident that the workflow is functioning correctly and securely, you can grant access to others.

Enable the Workflow: If the workflow was disabled during testing, enable it in Workflow Settings.

Notify Users: Inform the relevant users or teams that the workflow is ready for use. Provide any necessary training or documentation to help them understand how to use it. Use the Workflow Description option in Workflow Settings to add a summary of the workflow's purpose, which will appear on the workflow tile and in the workflow view.

Best Practices for Permissions and Privacy

Least Privilege Principle: Only grant the minimum permissions necessary for users to perform their tasks.

Regular Reviews: Periodically review permissions to ensure they remain appropriate as your team and processes evolve.

Audit Trails: Use Willow360's file history to monitor what happened to each document, when, and by whom.

Data Protection: Use secure storage destinations and apply redaction or digital certificates where documents contain sensitive or regulated content.

Summary

Creating and testing a workflow in Willow360 before granting access to others ensures that your processes are efficient, secure, and reliable. By following these steps and best practices, you can confidently deploy workflows that enhance productivity while maintaining control over permissions and privacy.