What is a workflow?

A workflow is the series of steps a task goes through, in a set order, often with more than one person or system involved. Every team has workflows, whether or not they are written down: how a new hire gets set up, how a customer complaint is handled, or how a blog post goes from draft to published. A workflow can be entirely manual, partly automated, or fully automated.

Take invoice handling. An invoice arrives by email, someone saves the attachment, enters the amount into the accounting system, sends it to a manager for approval, and schedules payment once it is approved. Each of those is a step, and the order matters. Writing the steps down makes it clear who does what, where work tends to stall, and which steps are repetitive enough to automate.

In automation tools, the word has a narrower meaning: a workflow is a saved set of instructions that runs by itself. It usually starts with a trigger, the event that kicks it off, followed by one or more actions, the tasks it carries out. Different tools use their own names for the same idea, such as a Zap in Zapier or a scenario in Make.

An example

When a new employee is added to the HR system, a workflow creates their accounts, adds them to team channels, and schedules a welcome meeting.