Understanding the Example Use Case

 

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The example workflow process controls a change request (CR) item and has several possible steps:

New The customer generates feedback, which is entered into the system. The team must be notified that a CR has entered the system. The CR is assigned to the Customer Liaison for review. The Customer Liaison responds to the customer and evaluates the CR.
PM Evaluation If the CR is a suggestion for product enhancement, it is forwarded to the PM for review. If the PM decides to implement the suggestion, the CR is sent to the EM for scheduling and assignment. Otherwise, the CR is closed.
EM Processing All CRs that are to be acted upon must go to the EM for scheduling and assignment.
Implementation This step has two possible solutions.
  1. Product enhancements proceed to the research and development (R and D) group for implementation.
  2. Defect reports go to Product Maintenance to be fixed.
Testing All changes to the product must be tested by the QA department. If the change does not pass testing, it’s returned to the engineer for more work, otherwise, the CR is closed.
Closed. There are three possible states for closed CRs.
  1. If the CR is a suggestion that has not been implemented, the team is notified that the CR is closed and the customer is sent an appropriate thank you note.
  2. If the CR is a suggestion that has been implemented, the team is notified that the CR is closed, the customer is sent an appropriate thank you note, and Marketing is notified of the product’s new feature.
  3. If the CR is a defect that is fixed, the team is notified that the CR is closed, Customer Support is notified that the problem has been fixed, and the customer is sent an appropriate thank you note.
Customer Letter After the Customer Liaison has sent the appropriate thank you letters, the item’s workflow control property (Workflow Status) is set to Customer Letter.

In addition to these steps, a special entry step must be created for use during the creating of new items. This step is usually named “0. Entered”.

For newly created items, the entry step controls what user sees and can do. In this example, all new change requests will automatically start with a Workflow Status of “1. New” because that is what the “0. Entered” step will dictate.

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