How to Build a Workflow Using Workflow Designer

With Ironclad Workflow Designer, it’s quick and easy to automate contract templates at your company.

Note:Workflow Designer needs to be enabled by your Customer Success Manager. If you haven’t done so already, reach out to your CSM or submit a request with our Support Team to learn more about Workflow Designer pricing and support packages.

Once enabled, Workflow Designer is only accessible to Ironclad power users. For more information on user permissions please reference the Understanding Permissions article.

Getting Started

Start by clicking the Workflow Designer tab. Then upload and name your template.

Select Paper Source

Select whether your workflow will be My company's paper, The counterparty's paper, or both. Once you have made that decision, click 'Save paper source' to proceed.

Tag Your Template

Once you’ve uploaded your template you’ll be taken to the screen where you’ll tag the document. Tagging is the process of identifying areas of the template text that Ironclad will need to replace, such as the agreement date and parties’ names.

As you highlight a section of the text, you’ll see a list of properties pop up. Select the appropriate property to insert a tag.

Can’t find the property you’re looking for? No problem. Just type the property name you need and select Create New Property. Also, be sure to select the appropriate property type for what you are creating.

Don’t forget to add signature properties to your templates! Your eSignature provider will recognize these tags automatically without you or someone on your team needing to prepare the document manually each time the workflow is used.

Organize Your Launch Form

Once you've finished tagging the template, you're ready to prepare the Launch Form. Properties that were tagged in the template are automatically added to the Launch Form.

Hover over questions (or sections) to reorder them by drag and drop.

You can also edit the label, add descriptor text, and edit the property type.

Questions of text property types can be represented in multiple ways. For example, if you tagged a Venue clause in your template, you can provide a dropdown list of options to select from or have your business users respond as a short response.

Assign Roles

Workflow Designer lets you configure three types of roles:

• Approvers: Assigned to review and approve contracts on the Review step of the Workflow.
• Signers: Sign on behalf of your company.
• Archivers: If a document has been manually uploaded during a workflow, the Archiver will be assigned to review and approve the final properties.

For more information, please visit the article on Modifying Roles in Workflow Designer.

Document File Paths

Ironclad allows you to customize your file paths for saving. One of the last steps of building your workflow is to review and customize the document file paths. Under the Archive tab > File Management you can change the file paths for your document.

Click inside the file path to edit the folder titles (from "Agreements" to NDA)

Note:The forward slash designates subsequent folders.

To utilize Rich Text Editor when tagging File Paths and File Names, begin with a bracket [ and begin typing to view the dropdown of available properties:

Title Configurations

Configure your workflow's title using the tag menu. Click the gear icon next to the workflow title to select between Default or Custom workflows titles.


If you want to create a custom workflow title based off of an existing property, in the Internal Workflow and Record Display property, enter a title using existing tags. For example, WonderWeb Inc. wants their workflow's title to reflect the amendment number and counterparty name. They enter the following:

The workflow title reflects the tags' values.

Publish

Ready to publish? First, check your guardrails if there are any errors that will prevent you from publishing your workflow for use. Warnings won’t prevent you from publishing your workflow, but it’s worth looking into what is causing that warning.

If you don’t have any errors or warnings, you’ll see a green checkmark that signals your workflow is ready for publishing. Now hit that green Publish button! After you click Publish, a modal appears where you can add notes and context to that version of the workflow's configuration.

Note: Publish a workflow configuration multiple times to generate multiple updated versions, each with publish notes, to provide users with more context and insight into the workflow's functionality. 

Congratulations! Once published, new workflows will appear immediately under the Start Workflow dropdown list on the Dashboard.

Need to make changes to your template?

If you need to make changes to the template of your Workflow, you can download the current version from Workflow Designer, make your edits, then Upload the template back into the workflow.

To increase engagement with your new workflow, consider integrating the workflow with Salesforce, if applicable, or send an email to your business users to let them know it’s available!

You can also control who has access to the workflow by utilizing Ironclad's advanced permissions settings.