Multi-Interface Workflow Designer for Business Users
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current programmatic workflows are often generic and cumbersome, requiring significant time, talent, and cost to customize, and often result in mismatched expectations between workflow owners and technical professionals due to their static nature and limited accessibility.
Innovation Solution
A collaborative, visual workflow designer tool with multiple interfaces allows line-of-business users to create high-level processes that are translated into standard-configuration workflows, enabling collaboration and customization through data organization in blocks, decision trees, and natural language processing, facilitating communication and refinement between users with varying technical capabilities.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of manufacture
If programmatic workflows are made generic and standardized, then ease of manufacture and device complexity are improved, but adaptability and ease of operation deteriorate
Solution Approach 1:
The workflow is segmented into discrete, reusable components or building blocks that can be individually selected and configured. This allows the workflow to be constructed from standardized elements while still enabling customization through different combinations and arrangements of these segments.
Solution Approach 2:
The workflow system transitions from a static, fixed structure to a dynamic, configurable structure where parameters and connections can be adjusted. This enables the same standardized framework to adapt to different business needs through parameter modification rather than complete redesign.
2Manufacturing precision
If workflow design is performed manually by technical professionals, then manufacturing precision and reliability are improved, but productivity and loss of time worsen
Solution Approach 1:
Standard workflow templates, components, and best practices are prepared in advance by experts. These pre-configured elements encapsulate proven designs and logic, allowing users to quickly assemble high-quality workflows without starting from scratch, thus maintaining precision while accelerating creation.
Solution Approach 2:
Proven workflow designs and patterns are copied and reused across different projects. Instead of manually designing each workflow from scratch, users can replicate successful templates and adapt them to new requirements, ensuring consistent quality while dramatically reducing design time.
3Measurement precision
If workflow tools are made static and technical, then measurement precision and reliability are improved, but ease of operation and adaptability worsen
Solution Approach 1:
A visual, intuitive interface acts as an intermediary between the user and the underlying technical workflow engine. This intermediary layer translates simple user actions into precise technical specifications, allowing users with varying technical expertise to define complex workflows accurately without needing to understand the underlying complexity.
Solution Approach 2:
The workflow design interface adds a visual, spatial dimension to the traditionally text-based or form-based technical workflows. By representing workflows as graphical flows with visual connectors and nodes, the system makes complex relationships more intuitive and easier to comprehend while maintaining precise technical definitions.
4Manufacturing precision
If workflow creation requires multiple specialized tools, then manufacturing precision is improved, but device complexity and ease of operation worsen
Solution Approach 1:
Multiple previously separate workflow tools and functions are merged into a single integrated platform. This unified tool combines template management, drag-and-drop design, configuration, validation, and deployment capabilities, eliminating the need to switch between multiple specialized tools while maintaining precise workflow configuration through the integrated feature set.
Data Source
AI summary
The present disclosure provides systems and methods for a synergetic, multi-interface workflow designer: a visual tool that enables the design, building, and use of high-level processes and standard-configuration workflows among multiple users with varying technical capabilities on multiple systems. For example, it enables a line of business user to design and create a high-level process on a first designer interface. The process and its data are received by a second designer interface, which translates the process and data into a standard-configuration workflow. A workflow designer may access the second designer interface to create, refine, and finalize the standard-configuration workflow based on the data from the first designer interface.