Business process flow

What it is

A business process flow (BPF) shows the stages of a process as chevrons in the form header. The active stage is highlighted. Select a stage to open a flyout with its data steps, which are columns people fill in. Next Stage moves on, Back goes one stage back, Set Active makes a chosen stage active and the last stage ends with Finish.

The current stage is stored on a separate process table, with one process instance per row and flow.

When to use it

Use it when people should follow a known sequence, such as identify, analyse, resolve and close a help request, and you want to see progress on the row.

For rules that fire when a value changes, use Business rules. To see rows grouped by stage, use the Kanban view.

Licensing and configuration

Built in the business process flow designer, which runs in Power Automate and is part of a solution. Per Microsoft Learn, you can activate up to 10 flows per table, with up to 30 stages and 30 steps per stage, and up to five tables per flow. Custom tables need Business process flows (fields will be created) ticked in the table definition, which cannot be undone. Roles can be tied to a flow, and users can switch flows with Switch Process.

Pitfalls

• A stage with required steps blocks Next Stage until they are filled in.
• Stage-exit workflows do not run on the last stage, because no stage change happens.
• Multiple active flows on one row are possible, which confuses users who expect only one.
• Image columns do not work in a flow.

Try it in the demo

1. Open the first help request and look at the stage chevrons in the header.
2. Select the active stage to see its data steps.
3. Fill the steps and choose Next Stage.
4. Use Back, then Set Active on an earlier stage.