Workflow Part-1

Introduction
SAP WORKFLOW Concepts
Basic Workflow Terminology

The R/3 Integration Model

FI

SD

Financial
Financial
Accounting
Accounting

Sales
Sales &
&
Distribution

MM

PP

CO

Materials
Materials
Mgmt.

Production
Production
Planning

AA

R/3

QM

Quality
Mgmt.

Controlling

PM

Asset
Accounting

Client / Server
ABAP

Plant
Maintenance
Maintenance

HR

Human
Human
Resources

PS

Project
System
System

WF

Workflow

IS

Industry
Industry
Solutions
Solutions

Introduction
It handles
The Process
Ex: Releasing of Blocked Vendor

The People

Position of the workflow in the system

Business Workflow

SD

FI

MM

CO

PP

AM

R/3

QM
PM
HR

PS
WF

Integrated Applications

IS

Business Middleware Layer

Introduction
Workflow Automates processes

Involving range of activities/tasks

Occurs repeatedly in similar form
Involves people/Departments
Require high degree of co-ordination

Automating Corporate Processes

Proof of
Delivery Trouble
Report

Sales

Sales
Order

Sales
Management

Product
Planning

Customer
Service

Budget
Forecast

Production
Planning

Customer

Packing
Slip Invoice

Order
Processing
Assembly
Order

Assembly

Assembly
Order

Packing
Slip

Shipping &
Receiving
Shipping
Order Packing
Slip

Product
Product

Accounting

Invoice

Product

Business processes
Treasury

Risk
manage
ment

Financial
Accounting

Credit
control

Controlling

Sales and
Distribution
Logistics
Production

Exchange
hedging

Handling
payments

Customer
invoice
posting

Costing document

Incoming
order

Financin
g
decision

Vendor
selection

Transfer
order

Evaluation

Order
profit
ability

Service
profitability

Incoming
order
posting

Intercompany
billing

Intercompany
billing

Vendor
selectio
n

Productio
n
order

Production

Delivery

Sale
s
profit

Externa
l
billing

What does workflow do?

Treasury

Risk
manage
ment

Financial
Accounting

Credit
control

Exchange
hedging

Handling
payments

s
e
t
a
s
m
s
o
e
t
c
u
o
a
r
p
w
o
s
l
f
s
k
e
r
n
i
o
W bus
e
th

Controlling

Sales and
Distribution
Logistics

Production

Customer
invoice
posting

Costing document

Incoming
order

Financin
g
decision

Vendor
selection

Transfer
order

Evaluation

Order
profit
ability

Service
profitability

Incoming
order
posting

Intercompany
billing

Intercompany
billing

Vendor
selectio
n

Productio
n
order

Production

Delivery

Sale
s
profit

Externa
l
billing

Benefits
Faster and Simpler
Needs less effort
Easy to Learn and understanding

Benefits
Better control of
Information
Deadlines
Costs

Flexible to
Change

Workflow Terminology

Objects
Events
Methods
Tasks
Single Step
Multi Step

Continue...
Agents
Roles
Inbox/Outbox

Examples of Objects types

SAP Business object types

Invoice
Requisition
Material
EDI messages

Examples of Object Method

Post ( the invoice)

Approve ( the Requisition)
Change ( the Material)
Display ( the image)

Single-Step task : Example

Post invoice
Release requisition
Change Material Master
Approve absence

Events
Event is a block of code
can start/stop single/Multiple
tasks/Workflow

Events : Example

Parked document posted

Order Cancellation
Customer master change
Requisition approved

Graphical representation of a workflow

Structure of a Workflow Definition

Conditional
Process Loop

Activity

Parallel
Process Loop

IF
Loop

Deadline
Monitoring

Summary

events
events

The process design must...

... be defined as single-step or
multi-step task in SAP R/3

Multistep task
Workflow
Workflow
definition
definition

Individual activities in the

process must be available as
single-step tasks before being
included in multi-step task

Single-step
Single-step
tasks
tasks
agents

The single-step tasks refer to

an object type and one of its
methods...
... which enables access to
existing SAP functionality!

Object type
Method

Templates
SAP has built in Ready to Use Templates
Each module has templates
Easy to implement

templates

SAP Business Workflow Template Approx

More than 100 templates
AM

Asset Management

Financial

17

HR

Human Resources

25

MM

Materials Management

10

PP

Production Planning

PM

Plant Maintenance

QM

Quality Management

FI

15
R

SM

Service Management

Example

Mass processing of Assets

Purchase Requisition Approval
Engineering Change Management
ALE/Idoc Error handling in IN bound
processing
Leave Approval

HR: Notification of Absence

Absence Form

Employee

PD-Org Structure
Determine Manager

Dates
Reason

Manager Position
Holder
Employee Position
Holder
Route Review Request

Employees Universal Inbox

Option to modify and
resubmit rejected
application

Managers Universal Inbox

Option to release
or reject the absence
form
Route Result of Review

Structure of Work Flow

Transaction code SWDD
Documentation in help file

Universal Inbox
The end user interface is Universal Inbox
Support Alternative clients
MAPI clients
Message Application Programming Interface
Developed by Microsoft

SAP Gui
Java GUI
web

System Components
Workflow Definitions
Steps and Tasks, May contain agents and
deadline

Workflow item Manager

Initiate the events, monitor Deadlines,
terminate events

Integrated Inbox
Interface with users

Tasks

Workflow definitions are comprised of

single-step tasks, multi -step task, workflow
task and workflow templates

Customer defined tasks and standard tasks

Objects

The encapsulation of software for

performing defined business tasks

Demo Example: Workflow Definition

Submit notification of absence
Notification of
absence created
Approve notification of absence
approved

rejected
Revise notification of absence ?

Send mail
sent

no
Cancel notification
of absence
canceled

yes
Revise notification
of absence
revised

Resubmit for approval ?

no
Terminate workflow
Workflow
terminated

yes

Use of Organizational Management

Refers to current Organization
Automatic routing management for employee
changes
High flexibility

Tasks
To use methods of an object type in a
workflow ( single-step task)
As a framework for defining a workflow (
multistep task)

Task Types
Standard task (single-step task, task type TS)
Customer task (single-step task, task type T )
Workflow template (multistep task, task type WS)
Workflow task (multistep task, task type WS)
Task group (task type TG)

Role
You use roles to specify an agent (or
agents) for a task if the set of possible
agents is too large, or not specific enough.
By assigning work items to organizationally
suitable employees, responsibilities and
authorizations are managed efficiently, and
bottlenecks are avoided.
Roles are always defined across clients

Organizational plan
The enterprise-specific
organizational plan describes the
organizational assignment of the
employees. The aim of this is to
determine the responsibility of
employees for the execution of
individual business activities

Events
Identify the events required to initiate
and control the workflow.
Check whether these events are
defined for the relevant object types.

Create Organizational plan

Root Organizational unit

Create Jobs

Create Position

Search and assign user

Assign job

Organizational plan

2.Create Workflow

Maintain Task

Workflow template id

Agent Assignment