Configure business process flows

 

Applies To: Dynamics CRM 2015

Business process flows are guides for helping people get work done. Use business process flows to help ensure common tasks are performed consistently by all team members. You can enable business process flows for various entities, such as leads, opportunities, or cases.The procedure to create business process flows is similar to creating other types of processes, but configuring them is very different.

To learn more about why you use business process flows, see Business process flows.

In This Topic

Create business process flows

Edit business process flows

Create business process flows

When you create business process flows, you define a set of stages that contain steps. You choose various types of information to include for each step.

To create a business process flow go to Settings > Processes and choose New. For the complete procedure to create a business process, see Create a new business process.

As with other processes, enter the following information in the Create Process dialog box:

• Process name
  The name of the process doesn’t need to be unique, but it should be meaningful for people who need to choose a process. You can change this later.

• Category
  This property establishes that this is a business process flow process. You can’t change this after you save the process.

• Entity
  Select an entity to base the first stage of the business process flow on. The entity you select affects the fields available for steps that can be added to the first stage of the process flow. If you don’t find the entity you want, make sure the entity has the Business process flows (fields will be created) option set in the entity definition. You can’t change this after you save the process.

Note

Business process flows have a simplified way to reuse existing business process flows as an advanced starting point for new business process flows. When you select Business Process Flow as the Category, there is no option available to set the Type value as you can for other types of processes. Instead, when you open an existing business process flow, you will find a Save As button on the command bar. This will create a new business process flow that is the same as the existing one, except that the text (Copy) will be appended to the name.

After you complete your entries select OK in the Create Process dialog box. This dialog box will close and the dialog box for the new business process flow will automatically open. You can then enter stages and steps.

Edit business process flows

To edit a business process flow, go to Settings > Processes > Business Process Flows and then select the business process you want to edit. An example of the first two stages of a business process flow is shown here.

Expand Details under the name of the process, to rename it or add a description, and view additional information.

When you configure a business process flow, you can edit it and add stages and steps. For the complete procedure to edit a business process flow, see the eBook: Customize a business process in Dynamics CRM.

• Edit Stages
  Business process flows can have up to 30 stages.

  • To add a stage, select Insert stage beneath a stage and enter a Stage Name.

  • To remove a stage, select it and then choose the X in the upper right corner.

  You can add or change the following properties of a stage:

  • Stage Name

  • Entity. You can change the entity for any stage except the first one.

  • Stage Category. A category lets you group stages by a type of action. It is useful for reports that will group records by the stage they are in. The options for the stage category come from the Stage Category global option set. You can add additional options to this global option set and change the labels of existing options if you want. You can also delete these options if you wish, but we recommend that you keep the existing options. You won’t be able to add the exact same option back if you delete it. If you don’t want them to be used, change the label to ”Do not use”.

  • Relationship. Enter a relationship when the preceding stage in the process is based on a different entity. For the stage currently being defined, choose Select relationships to identify a relationship to use when moving between the two stages. It is recommended you select a relationship for the following benefits:

    • Relationships often have attribute maps defined that automatically carry over data between records, minimizing data entry.

    • When you select Next Stage on the process bar for a record, any records that use the relationship will be listed in the process flow, thereby promoting reuse of records in the process. In addition, you can use workflows to automate creation of records so that the user simply selects it instead of creating one to further streamline the process.

• Edit Steps
  Each stage can have up to 30 steps.

  • To create a new step, select a stage, and then select the plus sign (+) under Step Name. Enter a name.

  • In the Value column, select a field to use for data entry.

  • Optionally, you can select the Required check box for any required field.

  • To remove a step, select it and then choose the X to the right of the step.

• Add branch
  To learn about adding a branch to a stage, see Enhance business process flows with branching.

To make a business process flow available for people to use, you must order the process flow, enable security roles, and activate it.

• Set Process Flow Order
  When you have more than one business process flow for an entity (record type), you’ll need to set which process is automatically assigned to new records.. In the command bar, select Order Process Flow. For new records or records that do not already have a process flow associated with them, the first business process flow that a user has access to is the one that will be used.

• Enable Security Roles
  People will only be able to use business process flows that are associated with security roles assigned to their user account. By default, only the System Administrator and System Customizer security roles can view a new business process flow.

  • To set these roles, in the command bar, select Enable Security Roles. You can choose either the Enable for Everyone or Enable only for the selected security roles options.

  • If you choose Enable only for the selected security roles, you can select which security roles will allow access to the business process flow.

• Activate
  Before anyone can use the business process flow, you must activate it. In the command bar, select Activate. After you confirm the activation, the business process flow is ready to use. If a business process flow has errors, you will not be able to activate it until the errors are corrected.

See Also

Business process flows
Monitor and manage processes

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