Read & Understood Workflow
What Is It?
The Read & Understood workflow allows you to assign Policies, Training Materials, and other important Documents to your team members and/or suppliers for acknowledgment.
Common Use Cases
- Company Policies requiring employee acknowledgment
- Training Documents and Procedures
- Safety Guidelines and Protocols
- Quality Standards and Specifications
- Supplier Training and On-boarding
Key Benefits
✅ Streamlined Acknowledgments: Automated workflow for getting document sign-offs from your team or your suppliers
📋 Compliance Records: Track who acknowledged documents and when, with completion dates recorded in the document grid
👁️ Visibility Control: See at a glance who's completed, who's pending, who’s overdue, and who needs follow-up
👥 Flexible Assignment: Assign to individual users, user groups, or both
📧 Automatic Notifications: Users receive emails with direct links to complete their tasks
🔄 Automatic Updates: When a document is updated, workflow automatically re-initiates for all users
🌐 Supplier Portal Ready: Works for both internal users and supplier portal users
How It Works- Quick Setup (3 Steps)
1. Prepare: Ensure Document is Approved or Approval Not Required
2. Enable: Go to 'Actions>Edit Properties' button, tick 'Enable Read and Understood Workflow'
3. Assign: Add Users and/or User Groups, set due date (default: +27 days) and save
Note: Users will then receive email notification and an action on their 'My Actions' tab. Once the action is accessed, Users will preview the Document using the 'Read Document' button, tick the acknowledgment checkbox and submit to complete action.
Supported File Types:
✅ Word (.docx), Excel (.xlsx), PowerPoint (.pptx), PDF (.pdf), Text (.txt)
❌ HTML and other non-previewable files
Note: If latest version of the Document is not a previewable file type, Read Understood Users will see the previous version of the Document, i.e. the latest previewable file type.
Key Features:
Assignment Flexibility
- Add individual Users or entire User Groups
- Mix both Users and User Groups in the same workflow
- Same User can appear individually and in multiple User Groups
- Smart email logic: Each unique User receives only ONE notification and ONE action, regardless of how many times they appear
Automatic Re initiation When Document Is Updated
When you upload a new version or publish your changes using Microsoft 365 for the Web integration:
- All Read & Understood actions reset to 'Pending' (even completed ones)
- Users receive new email notifications
- Due date resets to current date + 27 days
- Ensures everyone acknowledges the latest version
Note: If a Document has an Approval Workflow enabled, the Approval Workflow must be completed before the Read & Understood workflow will automatically re-initiate.
Task Management
- User Task Statuses: Not Started, Pending, Completed, Overdue
- Due Dates: Flexibility to adjust individually or by User Group
- Reminders: Manual. Tick checkbox and save to send. Bulk option for User Groups.
- Progress Tracking: See completion status in Document's Read & Understood Grid
User Group Integration
- Add new Users to User Groups → Users automatically assigned pending Read & Understood actions
- Remove Users from User Groups → Users lose access to Read & Understood actions
- Changes to User Group members reflect immediately in workflow
Permissions
- Edit: Users have full Read & Understood workflow management, including setup, action edits and triggering reminders
- Read Only: User can view and complete own Read & Understood actions only
- No Access: User cannot view any details of the Read & Understood workflow
Note: The System User Roles of Admin, Manager and Standard will have the 'Edit' access to the Read & Understood workflow.
Supplier Portal:
✅ The Read & Understood Workflow is fully compatible with the Supplier Portal. Suppliers can receive notification emails, see tasks in their 'My Actions' tab and complete acknowledgments just like internal Users.
When might I use the Read & Understood Workflow for Suppliers?
Send Policy Documents or Quality Requirements to Suppliers via the Supplier Portal for acknowledgment during on-boarding or ongoing management.
Important:
Document Eligibility
- ✅ Only available for Documents with a status of 'Approved' or 'Approval Not Required'
- ❌ Cannot be enabled for Documents with a status of 'Awaiting Review/Approval'
Re-initiation Behavior
- Both 'Publish as New Version' and 'Replace Current Version' options will trigger re-initiation of the Read Understood Workflow for all Users/User Groups selected previously. *Only relevant when editing Documents using the Microsoft 365 for the Web.
Bulk Setup
- Large Document uploads may require Technical Support assistance to aid in bulk setup of multiple workflows
- We strongly recommend using User Groups to manage large number of Users or different groups of Users
Reporting:
Dedicated Report coming very soon. The dedicated Report will be available from the Documents Module Reports Tab.For now a User, with correct Role Access, can view the status of assignees in the Document Page under the Read Understood Grid.