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About workflow automation

Automate routine CRM work by building workflows that run themselves when something happens on an account.

A workflow is a small rule made of three parts:

  1. A trigger — the event that starts it, such as an account being created or a monetary transaction being approved, or a schedule such as "every weekday at 9:00".
  2. Conditions (optional) — extra tests the account must match for the workflow to act, built with the same filter you use elsewhere in the Backoffice.
  3. Actions — one or more things the workflow does in order, such as sending a message, notifying an operator, updating a field, or reassigning the owner.

When the trigger fires and the conditions match, the platform runs the actions for you, in the background.

Prerequisites

  • You are signed in to the Backoffice with a role that grants permission to manage workflows.
  • You have selected the workspace of the firm you want to automate.
  • Workflow automation is turned on for your firm (see below).

Turning workflow automation on

Workflow automation is an opt-in capability. Until it is enabled for your firm, the Workflows page is reachable but shows a short "not available" message instead of the list, and no workflow runs. Enabling it for a firm is a setup step — if the page shows that automation isn't available and you need it, contact whoever administers your firm's platform setup.

Once it is on, the Workflows page shows the list and the New workflow button, and any workflow you enable begins to run.

The Workflows list

Open Workflows from the left sidebar to see every workflow in the current workspace, one per row:

  • ID — the workflow's identifier; select it to open the builder.
  • Name — the name you gave it.
  • Trigger — a plain-language summary of what starts the workflow, including the status change or schedule where one applies.
  • Actions — how many actions the workflow runs.
  • Status — the workflow's current health (see below).
  • Enabled — a switch to turn the workflow on or off without opening it.
  • Updated — when it last changed.

From each row you can open the builder to edit, resume a paused workflow, or delete it. Deleting a workflow stops it from running and removes it; work it has already done is unaffected.

Status at a glance

The Status column tells you how each workflow is doing:

  • Idle — enabled and waiting for its trigger; nothing to report yet.
  • Last fired — the date the workflow most recently ran (shown for scheduled workflows that have fired).
  • Failing — the workflow's recent runs have been failing; the badge shows how many in a row.
  • Paused — the platform has paused the workflow after repeated failures, or because the person it runs as can no longer act. A paused workflow does not run until you resume it. See Test and monitor a workflow.

Enabling and disabling

A workflow only runs while its Enabled switch is on. Turn it off at any time — from the list or inside the builder — to stop it without losing its definition; turn it back on to resume. New workflows start disabled so you can finish building and test them before they go live.

Whose permissions a workflow uses

A workflow runs with the permissions of whoever last saved it. It can only reach the accounts, and see or change the fields, that person is allowed to — the automation never grants more access than the operator behind it has. If you save a workflow, its runs use your reach from then on, so make sure you can reach the accounts and fields its actions need.

Limits

Each firm can keep up to a set number of workflows, and each workflow can run up to ten actions. When you reach the workflow limit, the New workflow button is disabled; when a workflow reaches ten actions, the Add action button is disabled.