2 min read

Workflow Ontology Series #3: Status Is Not State

Status fields compress messy operational reality into reassuring labels, often obscuring whether work is active, waiting, blocked, or merely untouched. A useful state model preserves those distinctions so managers can identify the right owner behavior and intervention.
2 min read

Workflow Ontology Series #4: Ownership Is Not Assignment

A name in an assignment field does not ensure that work will move. Real ownership means one accountable person clarifies scope, surfaces blockers, coordinates dependencies, seeks decisions, updates state, and carries the work toward its next meaningful condition.
2 min read

Workflow Ontology Series #6: Blockers, Dependencies, and Exceptions

Calling every stalled item blocked hides whether work needs intervention, depends on another party, or falls outside the standard path. Separating blockers, dependencies, and exceptions reveals who must act, what authority is required, and when escalation matters.
2 min read

Workflow Ontology Series #5: Queues Are Where Work Hides

Queues create the appearance of order while concealing untriaged, blocked, stale, or effectively rejected work. Distinguishing demand by state, priority basis, ownership, next action, and service expectation turns a passive backlog into a system leaders can manage.
2 min read

Workflow Ontology Series #7: Approvals and Decision Gates

Approvals protect work only when they function as explicit decision gates. Naming the decision, authority, required evidence, permitted outcomes, and service expectation prevents ritual review from becoming a hidden queue that delays work without managing risk.
2 min read

Workflow Ontology Series #8: Handoffs Are Where Work Disappears

Most work does not vanish while it is being done, but rather slips through the cracks when handed off between people.
2 min read

Workflow Ontology Series #9: AI Workflow Readiness

Giving agents tool access without reliable semantics lets them act on labels that humans never trusted. AI-ready workflows define objects, states, ownership, action boundaries, source priority, escalation rules, and audit evidence so automation knows when to act or stop.
2 min read

Workflow Ontology Series #10: The Workflow Ontology Audit

A workflow ontology audit tests whether the system reflects operational reality. By examining object types, actual states, ownership, queues, blockers, approvals, and handoffs, teams can find where labels drift from work and target redesign where delay hurts.

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