A serial task workflow involves multiple individuals that each have tasks to complete. The workflow progresses as each task is performed, one after another. There are many serial task workflows found in HR processes, such as the process to set up work equipment for a new employee.

A New Employee IT Onboarding form serves as a perfect example for this kind of workflow. This guide follows our New Employee IT Onboarding template that we’ve created, and below you’ll find the key considerations for creating this type of workflow.

Setting up a New Employee IT Onboarding Form

In our New Employee IT Onboarding workflow, the process begins when HR submits an equipment setup request to IT for a new employee. Once IT has set up the equipment and provided appropriate software access, they’ll notify HR that the workflow is complete.

Roles

When considering roles involved in this serial task workflow, you’ll find the roles not only inform the above field settings but also enable the appropriate workflow links to be shared across our workflow as well.

In our New Employee IT Onboarding workflow, the roles include:

• HR - The Public role for new employee equipment request submissions.
• IT - The Internal role with admin access to set up equipment based on entry data.

Setting up various sections with Read-Only turned on for roles ensures that the right individuals can edit the appropriate fields relevant to them. In our New Employee IT Onboarding template, the Field Settings for each section include:

• For the HR Requestor and New Employee sections, set the Read-Only settings to For Roles > IT.

• For the IT Equipment Setup section, set the Read-Only settings to For Roles > HR. You’ll also want to conditionally set the Show This Field settings to only when the entry status is not Incomplete. This will ensure IT can input entry data only for a new setup request that has been fully submitted.

Statuses

The next step in building our New Employee IT Onboarding workflow includes customizing statuses for both HR and IT to easily track the state of a request.

The statuses in our example include:

• Incomplete - The default status for all entries that have not been submitted.
• Pending - The request for setup has been submitted by HR to IT.
• Complete - IT has completed the requested setup.

Actions & Email Notifications

The actions on our New Employee IT Onboarding Form are related to the two tasks required by each role in the serial task workflow:

• Submit to IT - For HR to submit a new setup request to IT.
• Submit to HR - For IT to notify HR a request has been completed.
• Update - For IT to keep track of their progress as each setup checklist item is completed, but the entire request isn’t yet completed.

There are specific Action Settings as well as custom email notifications set up on the form to keep our serial task workflow efficient. These are outlined below, but if you need more help be sure to visit our Workflow Actions page.

Submit to IT Action

Allow Action - Select ‘When’ and apply conditional logic to allow this action to be performed only when the entry status is Incomplete to ensure HR only submits new requests to IT.

Change Status To - Select ‘Pending’ to automatically update an entry’s status to Pending once an HR submits a new employee setup request.

Send Emails - Create an email notification to be sent to IT upon the action being performed. Mark this email to send always and use the Insert Field option to include the employee’s name, hire date, or other relevant entry data in the body of the email. Be sure to include an IT workflow link so that IT can access the entry data needed to process the request.

Submit to HR Action

Allow Action - Select ‘When’ to apply conditional logic to allow this action to be performed when the entry status is Pending. This will ensure IT cannot action any Incomplete entries.

Change Status To - Select ‘Complete’ to automatically update an entry’s status to Complete once IT submits the complete request back to HR.

Send Emails - Create an email notification to send to HR when this action is performed. Use the Insert Field option to prefill name of the new employee along with any other relevant entry data, and mark the email to send always. Be sure to include an HR workflow link to ensure HR can view the entry data.

The fields in the IT Equipment Setup section are only required when the action being performed is Submit to HR. This will ensure this section is filled out before sending back to the HR department.

Other Considerations

Once you’ve considered the above settings, it may be helpful to make specific updates to your workflow. For example, making certain fields read-only or conditionally showing a field based on status can help make your workflow more efficient for your scenario.

For more help setting up your workflows, check out our Workflow help section.