Maximizing Benefits of Electronic Workflows Presented By Blake Kline August 10, 2004

1. NIRMA Conference - 2004 Maximizing Benefits of Electronic Workflows Presented By Blake Kline August 10, 2004

2. Agenda • Definition of Workflow • Elements of Electronic Workflow • Defining Business Processes • Converting Business Processes into Workflows • Case History

3. What Is an Electronic Workflow? “The automation of a business process, in whole or part, during which documents, information or tasks are passed from one participant to another for action, according to a set of procedural rules” “The WfMC Glossary,” Workflow Handbook Glossary 2001

4. What Are the Elements of an Electronic Workflow? • Defined business process • Documents • Document lifecycles • Defined tasks in a process

5. What Is a Defined Business Process? • Defined set of steps or tasks • Defined progression of steps and tasks • Defined purpose of the process including policies and procedures implemented by the process • Defined groups/individuals who perform tasks • Definition of types of tasks (i.e. approval, review, signature) • Definition of document types used in the process

6. A Business Process example

7. What Are the Documents Used in the Business Process? • Distinct document types (i.e. drawings vs. procedures vs. FSARs) • Documents that accompany the package (approval forms, comment forms, review forms) • Documents that are the target of the business process (drawings)

8. What Is a Document Lifecycle? • Distinct states a document achieves during an approval cycle – for example: Draft, In Review, Approved for Release, Released, Revised, Retired • A change in state would change how the organization treats the document (i.e. an Approved procedure would be treated differently then a Draft procedure)

9. What is a Document Lifecycle - Example New version of Procedure is Procedure is Procedure is Procedure is Procedure is Procedure is sent for Approved for Released Revised Retired Drafted Review Release Only the writer A set of New version Version has Procedure (all New version sees this reviewers can viewable by been replaced versions) is can no longer version of the see the new entire plant. No by newer retired. This be edited. procedure. version. changes version. version is Procedure is Writer can edit Procedure can allowed. Viewable by marked retired viewable by the procedure be marked up Records and viewable Records and edited. Management by Records Management only and Management marked only. revised.

10. How Does the Lifecycle Interact with the Business Process? • Are there places during the business process when the document state changes? • How does the state change affect who can alter/edit the documents in the process? • What information about the document changes (i.e. approval date, status)? • What happens to the document lifecycle if the process is halted?

11. What Is a Defined Task? • An activity in a business process such as a Review and Comment activity or a Signoff activity • With a specific functional group tasked to perform the activity • Occurring at a consistent point in the process • With a definable set of pre and post activity inputs and outputs

12. Drawbacks of Paper Process • Inability to enforce policy or process • Inability to easily track progress • Lack of consistency in the process • Difficulty in ensuring the correct version of documents are traveling with packages • Difficulty in managing edits

13. Reviewer 1 Sends for Approval Email to Reviewers Reviewer 2 Procedure Writer Sends back to Procedure writer for changes Reviewer 3 How do you track the Process? Drawbacks of the Paper Process

14. Why Electronic Workflow? • Consistency of process • Ability to track progress of processes • Automation of package creation • Enforcement of Policies and Procedures • Audit trail of in progress and completed processes • Predictability for planning purposes

15. How Does a Business Process Become a Workflow? The workflow definition model consists of: • Business process • Workflow template • Activities • Workflow manager/management system • Workflow instances • Activity instances

16. What Are the Steps to Get There? • Model existing processes with an eye towards automation • Design new process to take advantage of automation • Make use of automation • Automate updates to ancillary systems • Focus on a task view • Plan for the need to update the electronic workflows to incorporate “lessons learned”

17. How Does the Business Process Relate to the Workflow? Managed by Business Process Workflow Manager Defined in Executes Business Process using Used to create Workflow Template Contains Workflow Instances Represented during run time by Activities Contains Activity Instances or Tasks

18. Case History of Large Mid-West Utility • Goal: Automate the business processes for selected Controlled Documents: • Drawings • Site Procedures • Corporate Procedures • UFSARs

19. Defined New “To-Be” Business Processes • Define new business processes to incorporate the use of electronic workflow • Focus on steps that change the document or the state of the document • Editing/markup steps • Review and comment steps • Approval steps

20. Defined Documents that Are Part of the Process • Documents that were the focus of the process • Forms that accompany the process • Reports for recording the results of the process

21. Defined Groups that Participate in the Processes • Groups that have approval authority • Groups that have technical review responsibilities • Groups that have regulatory review responsibilities • Groups that have edit and/or markup responsibilities

22. Define Document State Change Points • What Document states are changed during the process? • Where do the state changes occur? • What are the impacts of the state changes? • Changes to document permissions • Changes to document locations • Changes to document information

23. Define Business Process Decision Points • Are Regulatory Reviews needed? • What disciplines need to review the document? • Is the document internally produced or contractor produced? • Are there differences in the process? • How are signature steps changed? • If documents are rejected where in the process do they return to?

24. Defined Activities that Would Be Automated • Attaching standard forms to the workflow process • Automatic promotion or demotion of lifecycle states at key points • Automatic updates of information in other automated systems (i.e. work management systems, maintenance management systems, etc.) • Automatic feeding of documents to fiche production facility • Automatic assignment of review groups based on document information • Automation of report documenting the process

25. So What Is the Result? – A Site Procedure Workflow

26. So What Is the Result? – A Drawing Workflow

27. What the Workflow Participant Sees

28. The Benefits – The User View • A single place to go for controlled documents and associated forms • Confidence that all necessary forms are included • Confidence that correct versions of controlled documents are being processed • Better view and management of day-to-day workload

29. The Benefits – The Records View • Single place to track the progress of approval processes for all procedures and drawings • Simplified process for generating record copies • Push button release of documents needed to complete plant outages • Confidence that established release policies and procedures are followed

30. The Benefits – The Corporate View • Single place to view the progress of document processes across the corporation • Ability to model changes to business processes across multiple sites • Greater confidence in meeting regulatory audit requirements • Confidence that corporate policies and procedures are followed