Book Image

Visualize Complex Processes with Microsoft Visio

By : David J Parker, Šenaj Lelić
Book Image

Visualize Complex Processes with Microsoft Visio

By: David J Parker, Šenaj Lelić

Overview of this book

Every business has process flows, but not all of them are fully described to or verified for accuracy with each stakeholder. This not only presents a risk for business continuity but also removes the ability to make insightful improvements. To make these complex interactions easy to grasp, it’s important to describe these processes visually using symbology that everybody understands. Different parts of these flows should be collaboratively developed and stored securely as commercial collateral. Visualize Complex Processes with Microsoft Visio helps you understand why it is crucial to use a common, systematic approach to document the steps needed to meet each business requirement. This book explores the various process flow templates available in each edition of Microsoft Visio, including BPMN. It also shows you how to use them effectively with the help of tips and techniques and examples to reduce the time required for creating them, as well as how you can improve their integration and presentation. By the end of this book, you’ll have mastered the skills needed to create data-integrated business flowcharts with Microsoft Visio, learned how to effectively use these diagrams collaboratively, but securely, and understood how to integrate them with other M365 apps, including Excel, Word, PowerPoint, and Power Automate.
Table of Contents (14 chapters)

Matching the shape color with the swimlane color

If we look back at the Shape Data section in the ShapeSheet for the Process shape, we will see the following formula for the Value cell in the Prop.Function row:

=IFERROR(CONTAINERSHEETREF(1,"Swimlane")!User.VISHEADINGTEXT,"")

This is the formula that displays the header text of the Swimlane shape that the process is within. It does this by returning the value that is in the User.visHeadingText cell of the first shape with the "Swimlane" category that it is a member of. If it is not within a Swimlane shape, then it just displays an empty string.

Now that we know this, we can write a similar formula to get the fill color of the Swimlane shape, or just use the color of the current theme if it is not contained:

=IFERROR(CONTAINERSHEETREF(1,"Swimlane")!FillForegnd,THEMEVAL())

Now, we can put this into the FillForegnd cell in the Fill Format section of the Process master shape, as follows...