A collaborative app starts with the functions and their levels; a screen is attached to each level, people are assigned to each level, and the flow and trigger criteria are written last.
Answer them for the process you have in mind. Most processes answer clearly on the first two.
| Question | Collaborative app | Process app |
|---|---|---|
| Does the work follow the organisation? | Yes: it moves up and across functions and their levels. | Partly: it moves between roles, and the roles may sit in several organisations. |
| Who takes part? | People inside the company, placed at a level of a function. | Roles inside or outside the company: suppliers, carriers, customers, auditors. |
| What starts it? | A criterion on the data, a calendar date, or a person at a level. | A form submitted, a record matching a criterion, an event from a system. |
| What is the shape? | A hierarchy: each level sees its own view and passes the work up, down or sideways. | A drawing: lanes, boxes, decisions, parallel paths and loops. |
| Where is the weight? | In the sign-offs: who approved, who escalated, who was informed. | In the steps: what was checked, what was written back, in which order. |
| Typical examples | S&OP cycle, shortage room, budget review, audit findings, change advisory board. | Supplier onboarding, warranty claim, engineering change, credit limit change, incident. |
A capital request can be built either way. The difference is what you define first and what the running app looks like.
Each entry names its levels or its lanes, its screens, its data handlers and its criteria.
Yes, by composition. A collaborative app calls a process app from a level, or a process app raises an approval that runs as a hierarchy. Each keeps its own definition and its own log entries, linked by the process ID.
A process app with a form start is usually the fastest: 2 to 4 working days for a production-grade version in the catalogue estimates. Collaborative apps take longer because the hierarchy is defined once and reused: 5 to 8 days, after which each further app on the same hierarchy is quick.
Both read through data handlers, so both show live rows from the systems and both write back through released interfaces.
Process apps most often, through portal screens in their lane. A collaborative app can include an outside level, for example a supplier level under a category, when the collaboration itself is with suppliers, as in the supplier collaboration portal.
Bring one process and the systems it touches. In the first session we register the data handlers, draw the levels or the lanes and run the first screen on your live rows.
