What is a Workflow Diagram? Examples, Benefits & How to Build One

When you begin diving into an analysis of your workflows, you’ll likely start by looking at extensive maps of processes, which can be difficult to navigate. These are workflow diagrams: A visual representation of each step, decision point, and handoff in a process to better understand how work moves from start to finish.

In my own work, I’ve found that starting with a visual workflow makes all the difference — especially in complex projects that span multiple departments. It helps me make sense of complex dependencies and gets everyone on the same page from day one, which speeds up decision making and prevents costly missteps later.

In this article, I’ll break down what workflow diagrams are, when to use them, and how they can simplify even the most complex processes. I’ll also share tips from my own experience building and refining diagrams in Wrike — plus tools and strategies you can use to turn static visuals into real, actionable workflows.

Table of contents:

• What is a workflow diagram?
• History of the workflow diagram
• When to use a workflow diagram
• Benefits of using a workflow diagram
• Steps to create a workflow diagram
• Workflow diagram examples
• Components of a workflow diagram
• Turn workflow diagrams into action in Wrike
• FAQs

What is a workflow diagram?

A workflow diagram is a visual overview of the steps involved in completing a task, project, or full business process. It lays out the entire workflow from start to finish using standard shapes and symbols that everyone can understand.

A diagram of the business process shows the sequence of actions, people involved, and key decisions along the way. By creating a workflow diagram, teams can map out how work moves through their systems, improving understanding and reducing ambiguity.

Depending on who you ask, workflow diagrams may also be referred to as flowcharts, process diagrams, workflow charts, or even business process workflows. Regardless of the term, the goal is the same: Visualize the steps and structure of a process so it can be optimized, communicated, and scaled.

History of the workflow diagram

While the modern digital workflow might feel new, the concept of documenting processes visually has been around since the industrial boom of the early 1900s.

Early pioneers like Frank and Lillian Gilbreth believed that the best way to do something is the most efficient way. Their theory was based on the idea that if businesses identified all the parts of a process, business leaders could then eliminate unnecessary steps and improve the process of completing tasks with less time, effort, and waste.

Early diagrams from this time helped streamline tasks, eliminate waste, and establish repeatable best practices — especially as manufacturing industries scaled. Over the century, as business evolved, formal frameworks like Business Process Modeling Notation (BPMN) and Unified Modeling Language (UML activity diagrams) were developed.

These standards added more structure to workflow visualization, helping teams across industries like software development, e-commerce, and manufacturing to manage increasingly complex processes. Today, workflow diagrams are a foundational part of both operations and strategy, offering a shared language for how work gets done.

When to use a workflow diagram?

Organizations should use a workflow diagram when launching a new process, redesigning an existing one, or onboarding teams to unfamiliar systems.

Gathering information and compiling visual workflows makes it easier to identify friction points, eliminate inefficiencies, and track how tasks flow from one team member to the next.

In practical terms, teams use workflow diagrams to support internal processes like onboarding, procurement, campaign execution, or support ticket routing. In customer-facing work, diagrams can help visualize service flows, user journeys, or product development lifecycles. For organizations managing different departments with overlapping responsibilities, workflow diagrams provide a much-needed general overview that simplifies coordination and speeds up delivery.

Benefits of using a workflow diagram

Over time, I’ve come to rely on workflow diagrams as a key decision-making asset.

Visualizing a process helps me spot what’s working and pinpoint areas that need improvement. For teams managing complex projects or refining internal processes, these diagrams can unlock better communication, faster onboarding, and better alignment across departments.

Here are some of the most impactful advantages I’ve seen in practice:

These benefits compound as your team grows or your processes evolve. What starts as a simple visual guide can quickly become a strategic tool for identifying bottlenecks, improving efficiency, and aligning cross-functional teams.

If you’re building out workflows in Wrike, you can take it a step further by integrating workflow automation and custom workflows directly into your projects — turning your diagram into a live, actionable system that evolves as your business does.

Steps to create a workflow diagram

Creating a workflow diagram can feel intimidating at first, especially if you’re working with a complex process or cross-functional team. There are so many different examples of workflow diagrams that it can be difficult to know where to begin.

Here’s the process I follow when building workflow diagrams, whether I’m outlining a marketing campaign or process mapping internal request handling:

1. Define the process you’re diagramming

Start by clearly identifying the workflow you want to map. Is it an onboarding process? A content production flow? A procurement approval chain? Be specific about the start and end points, and what triggers the workflow.

In this stage, I usually write a one-sentence description to keep the scope clear for everyone involved — something like “This workflow outlines how new client requests move from intake to delivery” or “This process covers internal IT ticket resolution from submission to closure.”

It might seem like a small step, but having a crisp statement up front prevents scope creep and makes it easier to spot any gaps once you start diagramming.

2. Gather necessary information

Talk to the people who are closest to the process. This might mean shadowing a team member, reviewing standard operating procedures (SOPs), or pulling data from project management tools like Wrike.

In this stage, I suggest gathering the information, then verifying it by running quick workshops. In those sessions, use visual collaboration tools like Klaxoon’s Board, which makes it easy to sketch out processes using shapes, colors, symbols, and connectors.

I’ve found that this collaborative approach gives the team a shared visual reference — even in hybrid or remote settings — and helps us quickly spot areas that need improvement. That early alignment goes a long way toward building an accurate, useful diagram.

3. List out the steps required

Jot down every task, decision point, and handoff in a rough list before you get involved with any diagramming tools. Go step by step, asking, “What happens next?” and “Who’s responsible for this part?” This low-tech outline helps focus on the logic of the process without getting distracted by design.

More often than not, it’s during this stage that bottlenecks or unnecessary steps reveal themselves — like duplicated approvals or unclear ownership — which makes the eventual diagram much cleaner and more actionable.

4. Identify who is involved

Assign each step to a role or team. This helps highlight ownership and avoid ambiguity — something that’s especially important in processes that involve handoffs or approvals. By clarifying who’s responsible for what, you reduce friction and improve accountability.

When a workflow spans multiple departments, I use a swimlane diagram to make responsibilities crystal clear. It visually separates each team’s actions into parallel lanes, making it easy to trace how the work flows across the organization (More on the different types of workflow diagrams below).

5. Choose your diagram type and structure

Depending on the complexity, you might use a simple flowchart, a Suppliers, Inputs, Process, Outputs, and Customers (SIPOC) diagram, or something more formal like a UML activity diagram.

For visual sketches, use software like Klaxoon to draw out basic flowcharts and get early alignment with stakeholders. When it’s time to turn that draft into something scalable and actionable, move into Wrike, where you can build out the outline using custom workflows, task dependencies, and automation.

6. Add standardized symbols and shapes

Use shapes to represent actions, decisions, inputs, and outputs.

Sticking to standard shapes makes your diagram much easier to interpret at a glance, especially for new stakeholders or cross-functional teams. Clean, standardized visuals help everyone stay focused on the logic of the process rather than trying to decode what each shape means.

7. Review, validate, and iterate

Share the draft with your team to confirm it accurately reflects how the process works on the ground — not just how it’s supposed to work in theory. When people see the steps laid out visually, they often catch missing actions, outdated steps, or unclear transitions.

Don’t be surprised if you need to tweak a few things (or a lot). That feedback loop is part of the process, and it almost always leads to a stronger, more useful diagram.

8. Put the final product into action

Once your workflow diagram is finalized, don’t let it sit in a static file. This is the point where you shift from planning to execution — and that’s where workflow management software like Wrike comes in.

Take the approved diagram and translate it directly into a working project or workflow within Wrike. Each step becomes a task, each decision point becomes a status or approval, and handoffs are managed with assignments and automations. As your process evolves, update the workflow structure without losing momentum. That kind of flexibility is what makes the workflow diagram more than a planning tool — it becomes a living system your team actually uses.

Workflow diagram examples

Before building your own workflow diagram, it helps to see how structured workflows play out in different real-world scenarios.

Below are a few workflow diagram examples I’ve worked with or helped teams create inside Wrike. Each one illustrates how visualizing a process improves coordination, reduces bottlenecks, and aligns everyone from kickoff to reporting.

Customer feedback workflow

This type of workflow is all about turning incoming feedback into action.

• Information gathering: A customer submits a ticket or feedback form, often through a CRM like Zendesk.
• Request intake: The request is logged, categorized, and sent to the appropriate team — support, product, or sales.
• Prioritization: In Wrike, route that feedback into a shared intake folder using request forms and automation rules, then triage it using custom fields that reflect urgency, impact, or effort.
• Development and review: The team works through the issue or suggestion, often looping in cross-functional collaborators to resolve it.
• Progress tracking: Tasks are updated in real time, and Wrike’s integrations ensure context is visible without bouncing between tools.
• Approval: Once resolved, a team lead signs off, and the customer is updated.
• Reporting: Feedback trends are tracked and tagged to help refine future product or service decisions.

A swimlane diagram is best suited for this type of workflow because it shows how feedback travels across teams, from intake to resolution. It clearly highlights who owns which part of the process and helps prevent bottlenecks in multi-team collaboration.

Content review and publishing workflow

This workflow helps editorial and content teams manage production from draft to live — with clear checkpoints for quality, accuracy, and stakeholder input.

• Ideation and planning: Content ideas are sourced from SEO research, internal teams, or campaign needs. Track these in a centralized content backlog using custom fields for topic, format, and audience.
• Request intake: A content brief is submitted via a request form and routed to the content team. This kicks off a new task or project in Wrike, and relevant information is automatically attached.
• Prioritization and scheduling: Editors review the pipeline and prioritize pieces based on campaign timelines, search opportunity, or business impact. The content calendar is built using a shared calendar view.
• Development and review: Writers draft the content and route it through structured review stages — often including SMEs, legal, and design. Statuses in Wrike reflect each step, and approvals are managed with @mentions or formal review features.
• Progress tracking: Team leads monitor progress through dashboards, spotting stuck pieces and moving work forward by unblocking dependencies.
• Approval: Final content is reviewed, approved, and queued for publishing. Final statuses and file versions confirm the latest copy is ready to go.
• Publishing and distribution: The piece is published on the appropriate channel (blog, CMS, social), and tasks for distribution and promotion are triggered automatically.
• Reporting: Post-publication performance is tracked via linked dashboards or external analytics tools. Insights are logged for future optimization and planning.

This workflow is best visualized with a flowchart, which shows the progression of a content item through each phase — from ideation to distribution — and highlights key decision points and approvals along the way.

Employee onboarding workflow

This workflow helps HR and team leads give new hires a smooth, consistent onboarding experience — while keeping internal teams aligned behind the scenes.

• Preparation and documentation: Before day one, HR creates the onboarding project in Wrike using a prebuilt template. This includes tasks for IT setup, HR paperwork, training sessions, and team intros. Roles and due dates are assigned to the right internal owners.
• Request intake: Once a new hire is confirmed, a request form triggers the onboarding workflow. Details like role, department, location, and start date populate the project automatically.
• Task delegation and scheduling: IT sets up equipment, accounts, and permissions. HR schedules orientation sessions and shares welcome materials. Department leads plan role-specific training and assign first-week tasks in Wrike.
• Onboarding execution: The new hire receives a clear onboarding timeline — often as a shared folder or space in Wrike — showing exactly what they need to do each day. Tasks might include reading internal docs, setting up tools, or meeting key team members.
• Progress tracking: Managers and HR can track onboarding progress in real time through dashboards, making it easy to follow up on incomplete items or flag any issues early.
• Feedback and adjustment: At the end of the onboarding period, Wrike can trigger a follow-up survey or feedback task. Insights help refine the onboarding workflow for future hires.
• Reporting: Wrike’s reporting tools help HR track onboarding completion rates, time to productivity, and gaps across different departments or roles.

A SIPOC diagram is especially effective here, as it provides a high-level view of the onboarding process — from the teams supplying inputs (HR, IT) to the final outcomes (a fully onboarded employee). It’s a great way to align internal stakeholders on the big picture.

Components of a workflow diagram

Once you’ve mapped out the steps of your process, the next step is structuring them clearly in your diagram. Every workflow diagram is built from a set of basic components, represented visually using a consistent set of symbols and shapes.

Tasks

Tasks represent the individual actions or steps taken to move the process forward. These could be anything from writing a brief to submitting a request, depending on the workflow’s purpose.

Decisions

Decision points are moments in the process where a yes/no or either/or choice determines what happens next. They’re essential for visualizing alternate paths or exceptions in a workflow, and are usually represented by a diamond shape.

Inputs

Inputs are the resources, data, or triggers that kick off a process or step. These might include forms submitted, emails received, or approvals granted.

Outputs

Outputs are the results or deliverables produced by each task or phase. These help define when a step is complete and what should happen next.

Connections

Connections — typically shown with arrows or lines — link the various elements together. They illustrate the sequence of steps and help visualize dependencies between tasks, people, and decisions.

In the next chapter, dedicated to process mapping we’ll break down what each symbol means and how to use them effectively in your own diagrams.

Turn workflow diagrams into action in Wrike

Creating a workflow diagram is just the beginning. The real impact comes when you put that process into motion using expert workflow management software.

Tools like Klaxoon are great for visually mapping out your ideas in early planning stages, especially in hybrid or remote workshops. But once your workflow is ready to go, Wrike transforms a static diagram into a living, trackable workflow — one your entire team can follow, optimize, and scale.