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)

Labeling shapes and relationships

All flowchart shapes should be labeled with a short description, and at least the connectors exiting a decision diamond should be labeled to differentiate the yes and no routes.

Every shape in Visio has a block of text, even if there are no characters in it, and this should always be used in preference to a separate block of text to the page because the text will stay with the shape whenever it is moved around. Editing the text of a shape is usually as simple as this:

  1. Select a shape.
  2. Type the text; this will enter text edit mode.
  3. Hit the Esc key to exit text edit mode.
  4. Hit the Tab key as required to advance to the next shape that needs text.
  5. Repeat steps 2 to 4.

There is an extra step required in Visio desktop after using the Tab key because it does not automatically select the shape when we tab. It displays a gray rectangle around the shape tabbed to, indicating where the focus is, but then we need to hit the Enter...