SharePoint Workflow: Taking the Manual Out of Your Process Donald Donais

Donald Donais Avtex IT Pro Consultant ddonais@avtex.com Blog – Tales from IT Side http://talesfromitside.wordpress.com Twitter @dondonais

Overview Business Process Management Crawl, Walk, Run Approach Crawl OOB SharePoint Workflows Walk SharePoint Designer 2010 3rd Party Vendor Workflow Products

Business Process Management Systematic approach looking at org workflow more effectively, by reducing human error What is Business Process Mgt? Activities or set of Activities that accomplish Business Goals What is Business Process? A series of Actions, directed toward a specific aim or goal What is a Process?

BPM Survey June 20th, 2011 Assoc. for Information and Image Management (AIIM) SharePoint Survey – Expectation for future users #1 – “Lack of strategic plans on what to use it for” with to SharePoint ** https://www.nothingbutsharepoint.com/sites/eusp/Pages/SharePoint-and-BPM-Whats-your-Strategy.aspx “

Survey Continued Which of the following types of add-on packages planning to use with SharePoint? #3 #2 #1 Workflow /BPM Search /Analytics Secure & Rights Mgt

Survey Continued Which of the following process have you automated with SharePoint #3 #2 #1 Project Mgt Internal IT Support Other LOB Processes

Tips when Automating Business Process Make sure to define the process Define reasons for automation Necessary to define initial investment and maintenance costs Do not automate every step in the process Take the time to analyze potential ROI from process automation Make sure to consider the human element within process

Approaching SharePoint Workflows Crawl, Walk, Run…

Crawl Out of the Box Workflows

Walk Introduce SharePoint Designer 2007/2010 Workflows CodePlex Actions Introduce 3rd Party Workflow Tools 2007/2010 Use Visio Services to Visualize Business Processes 2010

Run Develop more robust workflows .NET workflows Integrated systems Custom .NET Actions and Conditions for SharePoint Designer Advanced 3rd Party Workflow Tools

Why Workflow? One version of the truth Flexibility Auditability

Basic Workflow Capabilities Start Workflow Manually or Automatically Visibility into Running Workflows Collection of Historical Workflow Data Status of approval, errors,… Stop (or Terminate) a Running Workflow Tight Integration with Office

Understanding The Workflow Lifecycle Association Initiation Running Termination Remove Association Association When a workflow is associated with a list Data can be associated with the workflow Initiation When the workflow is first started on a list item Data can be associated with the instance of the workflow Running Status page reflects state of the workflow User primarily interacts via Tasks Termination End an instance of a workflow Remove Association

Workflows 2007 Out of the Box SharePoint Designer 2007 Visual Studio 2005 & 2008

Workflows 2010 Out of the Box SharePoint Designer New Site Level Workflows Customizable with SharePoint Designer Visualization with Visio 2010 SharePoint Designer Parallel Execution Paths Reusable Workflow Visualization/Design with Visio Exportable to Visual Studio Visual Studio Workflow Built-in Deployment/Debugging Tools Workflow Events Pluggable Workflow Services

Out Of the Box SharePoint 2007 Site Content Types Lists and Libraries Lists Publishing Approval Collect Feedback Collect Signatures Disposition Approval Three State* Translation Management Publishing Approval *WSS 3.0

Out Of the Box SharePoint 2010 Site Content Types Lists and Libraries Lists Publishing Three State* Approval – SharePoint 2010 Collect Feedback – SharePoint 2010 Collect Signatures – SharePoint 2010 Disposition Approval Three State Translation Management Publishing Approval * SharePoint Foundation

Demo Out of the Box Workflows

SharePoint Designer 2007 Next version of FrontPage! UI comprised of multiple panels Only Compatible with SharePoint 2007 (all versions) Allow Users to Create Workflows Associate Workflow to List or Library Workflow Designer Conditions & Actions – Augmented by CodePlex

SharePoint Designer 2010 Redesigned for SharePoint 2010 New UI Only Compatible with SharePoint 2010 Allow Users to Create New Workflows Associate Workflow to List, Library or Reusable (Content Types) Import/Export to Visio New Workflow Designer Wizard

Demo SharePoint Designer and Visio Workflows

Let’s set it up! Sales Documents Process If Estimate is >$100000 then . . . Automatically approved if less Manager Approved and email Sales and VP of Sales

Custom .NET Workflow Bring in the Reinforcements! You are here because: Missing Specific Feature SharePoint Designer Missing Action Custom Data or Actions Needed Existing Windows Workflow Investment State Machine Workflow Requirement Expose the Full Power of .NET Word of Warning – There is a steep learning curve

Custom .NET Workflow – The Platform Windows Workflow Foundation Its not just a SharePoint Platform Built into .NET 3.0

Workflow – Platform Implications Workflow a Core .NET Feature Workflow can be ‘hosted’ anywhere SharePoint was Microsoft’s first host (CRM 4 uses it now too) Custom applications can host it as well Standardized Format XML based file format (XOML) Widespread Availability

3rd Party SharePoint Workflows Nintex Workflow 2007 & 2010 Forms 2007 & 2010 K2 Blackpearl Blackpoint K2 Forms

K2 Visual Designer based in SharePoint Implement workflow logic without code Also has Visual Studio integration Rich visual designer from SharePoint Connect to AD or LOB data sources

Nintex Expand workflows beyond SharePoint Designer Implement workflow logic without code Rich visual designer from SharePoint Connect to AD or LOB data sources

Nintex Small Installation Footprint Start in SharePoint, stay in SharePoint Document Assembly and Conversion User Defined Actions (UDA) Lazy Approval Workflow Change Approval

Demo Nintex Workflow 2010

Resources SharePoint Workflow: SharePoint 2010: Workflow Resource Center | SharePoint 2010 (Dev): http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/hh295805 Workflows in SharePoint Server 2010: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/ff819861 SharePoint 2010: SharePoint 2010: http://sharepoint2010.microsoft.com SharePoint MSDN: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/default.aspx

Questions?

Thank you Donald Donais ddonais@avtex.com Blog – Tales from IT Side http://talesfromitside.wordpress.com Twitter @dondonais