Summary
A Workflow Template is a templated process, defining what actions (tasks and emails) should happen and when
You create a Workflow Template in the Workflows Module - this article describes the basic practical steps of how to do this
Once designed, activate your Workflow Template so it can be applied to specific Companies or End Users
Who is this article for?
All Planhat users
This article is particularly relevant for Planhat builders, such as CS Ops, who create Workflow Templates for their team
Series
This article is part of a series on Workflows:
Creating Workflow Templates ⬅️ You are here
Article contents
Click below to jump to the relevant section:
What is a Workflow Template?
You can read an introduction to Workflows here. Make sure you're familiar with the basic principles of Workflows before diving into learning about creating Workflow Templates. We list some key points below. 🙂
📌 Reminder:
There are two main types of Workflow:
Projects
Are optimised for task steps
Are designed for project management
Have a customisable, in-line editable, table interface
Sequences
Are primarily designed for sets of multiple emails
Can also include task steps
Have a streamlined UI, optimised for showing execution timing
Workflow Templates enable you to design a series of connected steps - actions that are either tasks (calls, meetings, reviews, and so on) or emails that are automatically sent. You configure when each step happens, and who is responsible.
Once you've created (and activated) the Workflow Template, it can easily be applied, either manually or automatically, to a Company or End User, either individually or in bulk.
Dynamic values
One of the great things about Workflow Templates is that values can be dynamically assigned. What do we mean by this? Well, for example, you can set that the Workflow should have the default owner of the "Account Owner" (field on the Company). Then, if that Workflow Template is assigned to Microsoft, and Bob is the Account Owner of Microsoft, he will automatically be filled in as the owner of that Workflow.
Similarly, when you schedule the steps in a Workflow Template, these are dynamic values, and will be filled in with actual dates when the Workflow Template is applied to a Company or End User. So, for instance, if a task step in a Workflow Template is set to have a due date of 5 days after the Workflow Template is applied, and it's applied on 1st January, the task will be given a due date of 6 January, but if it's applied on 10th June, the task will be given a due date of 15th June.
How to create a Workflow Template
To create a new Workflow Template, first go to the Workflows Module (playbook icon in the left-hand side bar). Then:
Click the "+" icon in the top left
Give your Workflow Template a name
Choose whether the Workflow is a Project or a Sequence
Select the target model - Company or End User
Your new Workflow Template will be created, and will open on the "Settings" tab - we'll go through that in the next section!
Click the GIF to view it enlarged
Workflow Template "Settings" tab
Let's go through the settings you'll configure when setting up a Workflow Template.
Click the image to view it enlarged
One cool thing is that each of these settings has a tooltip explanation built into the Planhat app - simply put your mouse over the "i" icon by each setting name for more information.
Let's consider each of these settings in turn:
Model
Choose whether your Workflow Template will be applied to Companies or End Users - this means the tasks and/or emails will be associated with them
Type
Select whether your Workflow is a Project or a Sequence. (You can view the main differences here)
Default owner
Choose the default owner of this Workflow Template, when it is applied
There is a default personal notification for when a Workflow has been assigned to you, so assuming this hasn't been disabled, the owner will receive this notification
This can be a dynamic reference, such as the "Account Owner", or "Technical Account Manager" (a custom team member field). If so, when the Workflow Template is applied, this will be filled in with the relevant person
Alternatively, you can select a named person to be the default Workflow owner. For example, if your Workflow is a Sequence of emails promoting a new training course for all users, the owner could be Becky, your Enablement Manager
Note that individual steps within a Workflow have their own owners, which can be different from the overall Workflow owner
Archive action
Choose what you want to happen to remaining steps if the Workflow is archived before all steps have been completed
The options to choose from are:
Mark pending tasks as "Won't do"
Mark pending tasks as "Done"
Remove pending tasks
For example, you may have exit criteria to automatically end the Workflow once an End User completes a course, if that is the goal of your Workflow, and you want any remaining tasks to be removed or marked as "Won't do" as they are no longer necessary
For more information on Workflow exit criteria, please refer to this article
If you manually archive a Project, you will be given the option to select the archive action from a dropdown menu in a pop-up modal
Days to complete
Here you can enter the number of days you expect the Workflow to take to complete
This is used to determine whether a specific Workflow (applied to a Company or End User) has the status of "on track" or "delayed"
A Company can be added / an End User can be added
Select how many times the Workflow Template can be added to the same Company or End User (as appropriate, depending on the model of the Workflow)
For a Company Workflow, the options are:
Once
More than once, if not already active
More than once, in parallel
For an End User Workflow, you can choose from options referring to either the End User or email address:
End User
Once
More than once, if not already active
More than once, in parallel
Email - these settings can be useful in cases where you want to avoid "noise" when you have multiple End Users associated with the same email address (such as support@companyx.com)
Once per email - every email address (even if associated with multiple End Users) can only have a specific Workflow Template applied once
Multiple times per email but only one at a time - every email address can move through a Workflow Template more than once, but never more than one End User per email address being active in the same Workflow Template at the same time (with no queuing)
Once per email if no other workflow active - every email address (even if associated with multiple End Users) can only move through a Workflow Template once, assuming that that email is not active in any other Workflow at the time of trigger (no queuing either)
Multiple times per email, if no other workflow is active - every email address can move through a Workflow Template more than once, but never more than one End User per email address being active at the same time across any Workflow
Consider what is most appropriate for your specific Workflow Template. For example, if it's a Company Workflow Template for onboarding, you're likely to select "Once" (as each Company will only go through onboarding once), or possibly "More than once, if not already active" (if there's a chance you may re-do onboarding for a Company - if they have a change in team members, for example)
Outcomes
Here you can enter the possible outcomes of your Workflow, such as "Successfully completed" or "Indefinitely put on hold"
You can tag finished/archived Workflows with one of these outcomes
If you manually archive a Project, you will be given the option to select the outcome from a dropdown menu in a pop-up modal
Outcomes are useful to help you assess the success of a Workflow
Enter when / Exit when
Optionally, you can select rules that automatically apply Workflow Templates to Companies or End Users as appropriate ("Enter when"), and automatically end/archive a Workflow ("Exit when")
You don't need to set both - you could have a Workflow Template with just entry criteria, just exit criteria, both, or neither
For example:
Automatically add all new SMB Companies to "SMB Onboarding Project"
In response to a drop in usage of a particular End User, automatically apply "Re-engagement Sequence", and as soon as their usage increases, remove them from the Sequence so they don't get unnecessary emails
Entry and exit criteria are discussed in much greater detail in this article
Workflow Template "Steps" tab
Once you've configured the settings, click into the "Steps" tab of your Workflow Template, and start adding your steps.
Steps are actions within a Workflow.
📌 Reminder:
The two main step types are:
Task steps
Particularly common in Projects
Examples include meetings, calls, reviews, set-up tasks, training, and so on
A task step could also be to send an email, but in task steps, emails cannot be sent automatically
Email steps
Particularly common in Sequences; also possible in Projects targeting End Users
These emails can be sent automatically
When you first create a new Workflow, two groups will be created for you: "Phase I" and "Phase II". You can edit these groups, and even remove one if you want. Each step will be part of a group.
To create a step, write the step name where it says "New step...", and press enter/return to save the step
To change the step type (between task and email), either click on the clipboard or email icon and select the other (shown in the GIF below), or use the keyboard shortcuts that show in the app
The default step type in a Project is "task"
The default step type in a Sequence is "email"
To edit a group, put your mouse over the group name (or on that line) so that the icon of 3 vertical dots appears, and click on that. Select "Edit Group", and you can change the name and the colour
Note that group names/colours are visible in the Portal, if you share any steps within them to the Portal
You can also create new groups, and delete existing groups, using the same dropdown menu. (Note that you can't delete the last remaining group, as there must always be at least one group for steps to be part of)
📚 Related articles:
To learn about why to organise steps into groups (theory and use cases), and to deep-dive into step details, check out the article "Workflow structure: groups, steps and step details"
To become an expert in scheduling your steps - configuring when steps take place - take a look at the article "Scheduling your Workflows"
Configuring default columns of a Project Workflow Template
When you design a Workflow Template, you create groups and steps, and you assign some dynamic values - e.g. you could say that a step owner should be the "Account Owner" and that it should happen "5 days" after the Workflow Template is applied.
In addition to this, when you are creating specifically a Project Workflow Template, you set the default column preferences in the table.
Remember that the steps UI of Projects is a table (usually of tasks). There are some standard columns automatically shown, but you can edit these, and you can also add some of your own columns. The columns are fields on the "Task" model, and you'll need to have created any custom fields before you can apply them here.
To remove an existing column, put your mouse over the column header, and click on the three vertical dots, and click on "Hide This Column".
To add a new column, you can either:
To add your column onto the end (right-hand side), put your mouse over the "+" symbol at the end, and select the column (field on the Task model) that you want
Or to insert your column between existing columns, put your mouse over a column header, click the three vertical dots, and then select either "Add column to the left" or "Add column to the right", followed by the column (field) that you want to add in
When you see greyed-out column headings, as in these examples, this is because you can't actually edit the column/field contents in the Workflow Template. If you put your mouse over the column name, you'll see this explanatory tooltip:
If we take the example shown above, "Escalate" is a custom checkbox (on/off toggle) field on the "Task" model. It wouldn't make sense to show or set the toggle in the Template, because whether it's turned on or off will vary in each specific Workflow.
It's only possible to fill in the table cells where you are setting something for the Project Workflow Template as a whole, such as writing the task description, or selecting the Conversation Type.
When your Project Workflow Template is applied to a Company or End User, it will initially be created with the default columns you have set up, with dynamic values (such as who the task owner is) filled in, and with cells (such as that "Escalate" toggle switch) editable.
Note, however, that individual users (your team members) can change the columns of their Projects. This will:
Only affect the user who edited
Be applied to all active Projects using the same template, for that user
Not update the Workflow Template itself
If you, as an admin, change the default columns in the Template, it will apply to active Workflows using that Template as well as new Workflows, and be shown to users that have not created their own column preferences. It's not possible for an admin to override or reset a particular user's column preferences.
Activating a Workflow Template
When you have finished designing your Workflow Template and it's ready to go, you need to activate it by clicking the blue "Activate Template" button (visible in both the "Steps" and the "Settings" tabs). Doing so will make your Workflow Template go from greyed out to normal font in the Workflows list on the left (although note you may need to refresh your window to see this).
Click the image to view it enlarged
If you have set Workflow entry criteria, your Workflow will now start being applied automatically to Companies or End Users as appropriate.
There are also a number of ways in which you can manually apply a Workflow, as discussed in this article.
Further reading
If you would like to learn more about ...