Article

How True Workflow Management Links Project Management with Your Microsoft Dynamics Accounting System

by Rudolf Melik
CEO and a founder of Tenrox,
The term "workflow" is unfortunately used loosely in the market place. Do not be fooled. Most systems claiming to be "workflow based" or "workflow-driven" actually do not provide any workflows! They simply hard code a project-related business process to the way they think you should be automating it, make a few settings optional, and call it a workflow.

A truly workflow-driven project management solution provides a graphical workflow engine at its core for all of the business processes it automates which allows you to draw your business process, similar to how you would design a chart in Visio. The difference is that as you draw the process, the workflow engine actually enforces and manages the business process and all of the business rules for you.

With a workflow-driven project management solution your data is audited, soft and hard validated, and approved based on best practices for whatever process you are controlling. All of the project management workflows that you need should be available out of the box; you should not have to build any to start; but you, as a business user, should be able to change them yourself at any time, create new ones, add new fields, set notifications, set role based assignments, set auditing etc all of this without IT's help or programming/technical knowledge.

As your organization matures, so will its processes. With a flexible platform for business process design and control , you can simply reconfigure your existing processes or draw your new process without programming.

So next time you see someone claiming to have a workflow-driven project management application, ask them what they really mean?

  • Does the application provide a graphical workflow engine?
  • If the answer is yes, is the workflow ...

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Accounting Business Central Business Performance Mgmt Business Process Mgmt Dynamics 365 Dynamics AX Dynamics CRM Dynamics GP Dynamics NAV Project Management Supply Chain Management Workflow Management Workforce Management
About Rudolf Melik
Rudolf Melik is the author of The Rise of the Project Workforce: Managing People and Projects in a Flat World, and is the CEO and a founder of Tenrox.  In his writings and speeches, Melik explores the ways that companies can thrive in a world where rapid technological advances and globalization are changing how we get work done and manage the people who do it.

Under his leadership, Tenrox, the leader in Project Workforce Management enterprise software, has grown to a company with more than 100 employees, and more than 800 customers worldwide.

More about Rudolf Melik