OLE Workflow Overview and Key Concepts

Workflow: Overview and Key Concepts

The Kuali Enterprise Workflow (KEW) is a general-purpose, content-based electronic routing infrastructure or workflow engine. Its main purpose is to automate the routing of electronic documents (e-docs) to individuals and groups for approval, yet the KEW can also be used to orchestrate complex processes between business components and applications. Approval routing is based on institutional or departmental business rules and policies. A new routing option called PeopleFlow is also available from the KEW to provide a streamlined way to view and update routing actions.  This section provides an overview of KEW as it relates to the OLE.

KEW Overview

Kuali OLE uses the KEW to handle the routing of electronic documents for actions such as approvals, acknowledgements and FYI notifications. Although much KEW functionality works behind the scenes, the action list and doc search buttons and the Workflow submenu (under Configuration) options on the OLE Admin menu tabs are part of the KEW. These workflow options allow you to access, act on, and search for many types of e-docs from various functional areas from a single location. Additionally, the Route Log tab on OLE e-docs is a workflow feature that allows you to follow the progress of given documents through the approval process.

Many facets of Workflow (such as the route nodes that define how a given document type routes) are stored in workflow process definition files for the various document types. These files can be easily modified to alter the default routing of documents in your OLE implementation, but doing so requires a technical resource and as such is beyond the scope of this documentation.

OLE Workflow relies on Kuali Identity Management (KIM) to specify when workflow action requests are to be generated and who should take action to fulfill them. Functional users employ the KIM interfaces to make changes that affect the routing of documents.

KFS Knowledge Transfer - KIM functions (roles permissions, responsibilities) was a video conference about roles and workflows. It also contains a visual demonstration about responsibilities.

PeopleFlow Overview

PeopleFlow is a new Kuali Rice feature that Kuali OLE is now using for License Requests and Electronic Resources. PeopleFlows are a prioritized list of people to send requests to. Essentially, it's like a mini people-based workflow that doesn't require you to specify a KEW node in the document type for each individual who might need to approve or be notified. You can define "Stops" in a PeopleFlow, where everything in the same stop proceeds in parallel, but all must be done within the stop before proceeding to the next stop.

You can call/execute a PeopleFlow from within a KEW workflow node directly, or you can invoke the Kuali Rules Management System (KRMS - a common rules engine for defining decision logic, commonly refereed to as business rules) engine from an application and any PeopleFlows that get selected during rule execution, defined in a KRMS agenda, will be called. In this way, you can integrate business rules across applications and workflows.

The same PeopleFlow that defines a routing order among a set of persons, groups or roles can be called by KRMS rules, with the KRMS rules defining which type of request to pass to the PeopleFlow (for example, an "approval" routing action or a "notification").

For information about creating and managing PeopleFlows in OLE, see in the Guide to OLE System Administration Functions.

Route Levels and Workflow Routing

Documents route by progressing through a series of route levels (also called 'route nodes'). Many of the financial e-docs on the Select/Acquire menu, and other e-docs throughout OLE, support both pre-established workflow routing and ad hoc routing. Here is an example of the approval route nodes that a typical financial processing document passes through:

In workflow routing, a document's type (General Error Correction, Transfer of Funds, etc.) determines the route levels it passes through. Route nodes are defined by document type within the workflow process definition file.
To view workflow process definitions in XML, use the export button on the Document Type Inquiry.

You may need technical assistance to understand or modify a workflow process definition file. Given that assistance, the file can easily be modified to change a document's routing behavior.

An easier view for functional users is located in the Routing & IDM Doc Type Hierarchy (Routing and Identity Management Document Type Hierarchy) option in the Configuration submenu on the Admin menu.

The KEW arranges OLE document types in a hierarchical fashion, with some document types being 'parent' to the document types below them in the hierarchy. 'Child' document types inherit attributes from their parents. The Routing & IDM Doc Type Hierarchy screen displays documents in their respective positions in this hierarchy and also displays the route nodes associated with each document type. Nodes are listed in the order in which the document progresses through them.

The following example shows route nodes associated with the Transfer of Funds document type viewed through the  Routing & IDM Doc Type Hierarchy.

Typical Route Levels of the OLE financial documents

Routing and roles inherited from KFS continue to be reviewed for the 1.5 release.  Many of the route nodes remain listed but are passed over in OLE.  These options remain available for institutions that wish to implement them.

Most, but not all, Kuali financial documents are able to progress through three route levels: account level, organization hierarchy, and special conditions.

Account Level Routing (Fiscal Officer)

Each account in OLE is assigned a designated approver called a fiscal officer. This individual is responsible for maintaining the fiscal integrity of an account and is often one of the first approvers to review a document that impacts the account. Most financial processing documents are routed to the fiscal officer for each of the accounts identified in the document. For example, Sue is the fiscal officer for account 1012300. All financial transactions involving this account are routed to Sue for approval.

Organization Review (Review Hierarchy) Routing

Every account belongs to an organization. The organization develops customized routing to appropriate roles based on criteria such as document type, dollar amount and override code. This routing may take advantage of the Chart of Accounts organization hierarchy, meaning that approvals are set up at different levels in the organization hierarchy. A document proceeding through this hierarchy routing might route to someone at the department level, then route to someone else at this department's school or college.

Organization hierarchy routing (corresponding to the AccountingOrganizationHierarchy route node) is very flexible and may be customized to be as simple or complex as needed. For example, it can be set up to accommodate appropriate routing when the head of acquisitions wants to approve every Transfer of Funds document over $1,000 that involves an account reporting to his organization.

Some documents without dollar amounts (such as account maintenance documents) also use organization hierarchy routing. While technically distinct, this type of routing functions exactly as described above without regard to dollar amount or override code.

Special Conditions Routing

Special condition routing is a blanket term for additional route levels that might be triggered by various attributes of a transaction. Special conditions often represent special administrative approvals that may be required. This routing may be based on the type of document, attributes of the accounts being used, or other attributes of the transaction.

Throughout the OLE Select and Acquire help documentation, we refer to route levels that are not fiscal officer or organization review routing as 'special conditions routing'. This term covers a variety of different types of routing that are explained in the help documentation sections about the various document types that use these route levels.

Examples of special conditions routing

Ad Hoc Routing

Ad hoc routing allows a document initiator or approver to add additional individuals or groups to the routing of a specific document. In most cases, ad hoc approvers inserted into the routing interrupt the regular routing process. For example, when a user initiates a financial document and ad hoc routes it to another user for approval, the document routes to the ad hoc approver before it routes to the fiscal officer.

Ad hoc acknowledge and FYI routing do not interrupt the regular routing process.

Financial processing documents with these types of ad hoc requests still pending post to the General Ledger as soon as all other approvals are obtained. The system does not put them on hold while waiting for the acknowledgement to take place or for the FYI to be cleared.

The following steps describe how to add an ad hoc recipient in the Ad Hoc Recipients tab.

1. Select an action requested from the Action Requested list. To route the document to an individual, select this option in the Person Requests section. To send the request to a group, select this option in the Ad Hoc Group Requests section.
   
   
2. To ad hoc route the document to another person, type the principal name in the Person box in the Ad Hoc Recipients section or use the lookup icon to search for the appropriate username.
   
   
3. To ad hoc route the document to a group, in the Namespace Code field in the Ad Hoc Group Requests section, enter the group name or use the Lookup icon to search for the appropriate group name.
   
   
4. Click . The system verifies that the person ID or group namespace code and name that you have entered for routing is valid.
5. Click on the document.
   
   After you complete the Ad Hoc Recipient section and submit the document, the system changes the Node(s) value to 'Adhoc' and changes the Status value to 'ENROUTE'.
   
   
   The Pending Action Requests tab shows the requested action and the user ID.
   
   

When a document is enroute, you may send ad hoc requests without taking a workflow action on the document. To do this follow the steps listed above but use the button instead of Submit.

When you review the Route Log immediately after submitting a document, you may not see the Pending Action Requests tab. This is because OLE has not yet received the routing information from Workflow. In this case, wait for a few seconds and click the Refresh button at the top of the Route Log to refresh the screen. You may need to repeat this process a few times until the information appears in the Pending Action Requests tab.

Viewing Route Nodes

To see the route nodes associated with a particular document type:

1. Click the  menu tab.

2. Select Routing & IDM Doc Type Hierarchy (Routing and Identity Management Document Type Hierarchy) from the Configuration submenu.

    

   

   
   The system displays document types in the hierarchy.

3. Locate the desired document type route levels.
   For example, you might scroll down to Transfer of Funds to view the rules of the Transfer of Funds document route levels.
   
   
   
   Beneath the document type, you see the nodes that the document routes through. The system lists these nodes in order from first to last. To view more detail about the KIM responsibilities associated with these route nodes, click the View Document Configuration link.
   
   
   
   
4. Scroll down to the Workflow / Responsibilities tab.
   
   
   
   In the Workflow / Responsibilities tab, the system displays the name of each route node along with the associated role(s) and other information. The first entry in the list defines the exception routing for this document type. This entry identifies the role that receives the document if Workflow encounters an error that prevents it from completing the document's normal routing.

In some cases a document may have route nodes that the document passes through based on certain conditions. These split or branching route nodes are indented to distinguish them from the route nodes through which all documents of this type pass.

Workflow Responsibilities

When a document routes through a particular route level, the KEW evaluates it against the responsibilities that reference this document type and route level. A responsibility acts like a trigger: If the document meets its criteria, the system sends an action request to a particular user or group of users.

Responsibilities are associated with roles in KIM. Roles have members or assignees who are represented in the system as persons, groups, or other roles. Users assigned to a role inherit the role's responsibilities, meaning that they receive action requests from Workflow when specified conditions are met.

To view responsibilities, select the Responsibility option from the System submenu on the  menu.

Each responsibility includes several attributes (that is, values and details) that determine when it is triggered.

Responsibilities lookup results definition

While responsibilities are created and maintained in two central locations, users may supply qualifying values when assigning users to a role associated with these responsibilities. These qualifying values generally identify specific circumstances under which the responsibility is invoked. For example, if a departmental user adds a user to a role with a responsibility that refers to an organization hierarchy route node, the departmental user supplies the appropriate chart and organization code. Subsequently, only documents that contain this chart and organization code route to the specified user.

For more information about roles and responsibilities, see in the Guide to OLE System Administration Functions.

Route Log

The Route Log tab displayed on all OLE e-docs shows workflow status details. The Route Log is can have up to these four subtabs---Document ID, Actions Taken, Pending Action Requests, and Future Action Requests.

Route Log tab definition

Actions Taken Tab

The Actions Taken tab displays the history of workflow actions on the e-doc.

This tab lists each action taken, the name of the person who took this action, and the time and date the action was taken. The For Delegator field shows the name of a delegate that took action on someone else's behalf. For example, for account routing the fiscal officer's name would be shown here if this person's delegate took action on the document.

To drill down into the details of each action, click .

The system displays the detail.

Several layers of information may be available for an action request.

Pending Action Requests Tab

The Pending Action Requests tab displays the next action to be taken and shows more detailed routing information about this request. Only action requests at the current route node are displayed.

Viewing Pending Actions

The following example shows a document that is awaiting approval by one fiscal officers.

The Action field indicates whether the document is in a user or group's action list or is pending their approval. An action of Pending Approve means Workflow has identified other approval actions needed at this route node, but it has not actually sent these requests yet. Pending approval actions may be determined by the Priority attribute on the appropriate workflow responsibilities.

The Requested Of field displays the name of the user or group responsible for the pending action. The value in this field is based on the responsibility at this current route level. In cases where a document routes to a role with more than five members the name of the role will be displayed along with any qualifying values pertaining to the role assignees who received the request.

Note that the Pending Action Requests tab shows pending requests only for the document at its current route node. The system may add new requests when the document transitions to a new route level.

To identify members of a group whose ID is displayed in the Requested Of field, click the link for the group ID. The system displays information about the group members.

If multiple users are identified as the recipients of a single action request, the number of actions required is controlled by the action policy code associated with the responsibility that generated the request.

• If this code is set to 'ALL,' all users specified must take the required action on the document before the request will be cleared.
• If the action policy code is 'FIRST,' the first of the specified users to take the action will cause the system to clear the action request for all other users with the same request.

Future Action Requests Tab

When a document's status is 'saved' or 'enroute,' the Future Action Requests tab on the Route Log shows the action requests that Workflow will generate in the future based on the information currently on the document.

To open this section and view the future action requests, click the button. Future action requests are listed in the order in which they are to occur.

As a document routes and users take action on it, the system updates the contents of the Future Action Requests tab to show only those requests that have not yet been made by Workflow. When a document reaches 'Final' or 'Processed' status in Workflow, this tab becomes empty because there are no future requests to display.

The Annotation entry is a message that is generated based on the KIM responsibilities being referenced by Workflow.

Viewing Routing Details

To display more detailed routing information about the request, click .

The resulting display contains additional information about the request.

Pending Action Requests detail definition

Route Status

Route status indicates where a document is in its routing process. For any given document, the system displays route status in both the Route Log tab and the document header.

The following table summarizes the meaning of various route statuses in the KEW.

Route status

A user does not ordinarily see a Status value of 'Approved' or 'Committed'. The system displays these statuses to users only as a result of a system error or performance issue.

Action List

In OLE, you receive action requests for e-docs through your action list. This list provides summary information about each document that requires your attention, such as document type, title, route status, the type of action requested of you, who initiated the document, when it was created, and whether or not you've received this request because you are a delegate or a member of a group.

1. Click .
   
   The Workflow system retrieves all documents that you have initiated and saved and any documents that are routed to you to approve, acknowledge, or FYI.
   
   
2. Click the document Id link to open the document.
   
   The system displays a set of buttons at the bottom of the screen. The buttons you see depend on your role and the requested action.
   
   
3. Click one of the workflow action buttons.

Workflow Action Buttons

When you open a document, you see various workflow action buttons at the bottom of the page. The buttons vary depending on the kind of action request you have received for the document and the KIM role(s) to which you belong. 

Some additional buttons are available, depending on the the e-doc you are viewing.  These buttons are described within their particular guide.

Workflow action buttons

Special attention should be paid when you select any of the workflow action buttons noted below.

Blanket Approving a Document

If you are a member of a role with a blanket approve document permission (such as the OLE-SYS Manager role), you have the option to blanket approve a document routed to you for your approval.

Note that you can only blanket approve a document you are initiating or a document for which you already have an approval request.

Click to approve the document bypassing all other approvals.

Disapproving a Document

1. Click .
2. Enter a reason for disapproval, and then click yes to confirm.

After you complete the disapprove action, the system displays the reason in the Notes and Attachment tab.

Acknowledging a Document

Acknowledgements do not interrupt the normal workflow routing of a document. They do not stop a document from routing on to other individuals, groups, or roles who need to take approval actions.

Click .

FYI

FYIs do not interrupt the normal workflow routing of a document.

To signify that you have responded to the FYI action, you may take either of two actions:

• Click when you open the document
• or, in the action list, select in the Actions column and click .

Setting the default action for FYI: To clear all FYI actions in the action list simultaneously, first set the default action from 'NONE' to 'FYI'.

Next, click apply default (in the upper right corner) and then click take actions.

Correcting Errors after Approval

In financial e-docs, the error correction action allows you to correct documents by creating a new document that reverses the original transaction that has been fully approved. A document created with the error correction action must route and be approved in the same manner as the e-doc it corrects.

The error correction action should not be confused with the financial transaction document type General Error Correction (GEC), which is described in "General Error Correction" in the Guide to Managing and Encumbering Funds in the Driver's Manual.

1. Click .
   The system creates a new document with a new document ID. The system also displays Corrects Document ID in both the document header and the Notes and Attachment tab of the document.
   
   
   
   Amounts are in negative to reverse the original transaction.
   
   
   
   The new document has an annotation that is an error correction.
   
   
   
   
2. Click submit.
   The header of the corrected document shows the corrected by document ID.
   
   

Workflow Preferences

The system allows you to change the automatic refresh rate, action list page size, email notification, and row colors that indicate the status of the document. You may also limit the list of documents in the action list by setting filters for delegators or workflow status. To make any of these changes, click the preferences button in the action list.

The system displays the Workflow Preferences screen.

Workflow Preferences field definition

To save your preferences, click .

To return to the default preferences, click .

Color changes do not take place until the next time you log onto the system.

Action List Filter

Setting a filter allows you to display a subset of the action list.

1. To go to the Action List Filter dialog box, click the Filter button.
   
   

2. Specify filtering criteria in the Action List Filter dialog box.
   
   
   
   Action List Filter definition

   Criteria	Description
   Document Title	Enter a partial or full character string that you are looking for in the document description. For example, enter 'Test' to see all documents that contain 'Test' in the document description. This field is case sensitive. Select the Exclude? check box to exclude documents with the specified title from the list.
   Document Route Status	Select the route status you want. The choices are 'All,' 'Approved,' 'Disapproved,' 'Enroute,' 'Exception,' 'Processed and Saved'. Select the Exclude? check box to exclude documents with the selected status from the list.
   Action Requested	Select an action from the list. The choices are 'Acknowledge,' 'Approve,' 'Complete,' and 'FYI'. Select the Exclude? check box to exclude documents with the selected action from the list.
   Action Requested Group	Select the name of the group that is requested to take an action.
   Document Type	Select a document type from the lookup . Select the Exclude? check box to exclude documents with the selected type from the list.
   Date Created	Enter a date range or select dates from the calendar to limit the documents based on the date they were created. Select the Exclude? check box to exclude documents that were created during this given time range.
   Date Last Assigned	Enter a date range or select dates from the calendar to limit the documents based on the date that this action item was generated for you. Select the Exclude? check box to exclude documents that entered your action list during this given time range. The acceptable format is mm/dd/yyyy.

3. Click .

The system displays a message in the upper left corner.

Clearing the Action List Filter

The Clear Filter button is visible only when you have previously created the filter.

To remove the filter and view the entire list, click the button.

Advanced Document Searches

In Using Doc Search to Find a Document, we introduced the basic search capabilities within the KEW. The system also provides more advanced and sophisticated search capabilities.

Detailed vs. Basic Searches

When you click the doc search button, the system displays a search screen that initially defaults to a basic search.

To switch between the basic search and detailed search, click the detailed search or basic search button near the top of the screen. The detailed search screen gives you more options for specifying search criteria.

Superuser vs. Non-Superuser Searches

The search screen initially defaults to a non-superuser search mode. If you are a member of a role (e.g., the OLE-SYS Workflow Administrator role) that has the administer routing for document permission, you may switch between non-superuser search and superuser search mode by clicking the Superuser Search or Non-Superuser Search link.

The superuser search mode gives you more search options and allows you to access documents you wish to take superuser actions on, such as bypassing an approval or sending a document to another route level.

Anyone can search for documents using superuser search, but only users with an appropriate role can actually take special actions on the documents retrieved by the superuser search function.

Document-Specific Searches

Document-specific searches allow you to specify additional criteria when you search specific document types or groups of documents such as financial transactions or purchasing/accounts payable documents. In addition to the standard search criteria available in the basic and advanced searches, document-specific searches allow you to specify fields such as dollar amounts, status, and document-specific reference numbers.

For more information about document-specific search, see the help documentation section on the applicable document type in the appropriate guide listed in the Driver's Manual.

You may also access these search options after you click the doc search button. To access document-specific search at this point, either enter the document type name and tab out of the field or use the Document Type lookup . The system displays the appropriate additional search fields.

Named Search

When you name a set of search criteria, the system saves your search as a named search. When you later click search, the system displays a list of all named searches you have created in the Searches list.

Clear Saved Searches

• To clear all of your named searches, click clear saved searches. OLE clears the Searches list.

Clearing Search

To clear your previous search criteria, click .