A guide to the workflow states for conversations
As part of your workflow, an object is either “Open” or “Closed”. In this article we'll show you the twelve States that an object can be in at any moment, how to manually change states, what automatically applied states are, and how to search States.
Open States
| State |
Description |
| New |
It’s brand new. None of your team have touched it yet. |
| Assigned |
An agent has been assigned this object, or has taken ownership of it. |
| In progress |
An agent is currently writing a response to this object. |
| Responded |
A reply has been sent on this object. |
| Awaiting approval |
The object has been assigned to someone to approve the drafted response. |
| Follow up |
Acts as a flag on the object to indicate this requires a follow up action. |
Closed States
| State |
Description |
| Redirected |
Indicates the query has been taken offline, and redirected elsewhere within your organisation. |
| Closed |
The object has been responded to, and is closed. |
| Closed (thread) |
This has been automatically closed as one of the older objects in a thread from the same author.
Only the newest message in a thread will be left in an open State for you to action. |
| Irrelevant |
The object is irrelevant to the workflow or the business. |
| Duplicate |
The object is a duplicate of another in the workflow. |
| No response required |
No response is required on this object. |
How are they used?
States are either automatically assigned based on actions that you take, or they are manually changed.
Think of them as states of a ticket, or a request — your action depends on the stage (state) of the ticket (object).
Naturally, the action you take is up to you! States are an indicator that are open to your interpretation and workflow.
Changing States
Manually change a State
- Select an object from your workflow by clicking on it.
- Under Workflow State and Owner, the first dropdown you’ll see should have now changed to show the State as Assigned. From here, select the appropriate State.
Automatically applied States
Some States are automatically applied to objects, based on an action you perform, or where they sit in your workflow, or a conversation thread.
| State |
How it's applied |
| New |
All new messages that appear in your Inbox will land with the ‘New’ State applied. |
| Assigned |
Updated to this State when a ‘New’ object is selected from the Inbox. |
| In progress |
Updated to this State once you start typing a reply on an ‘Assigned’ object. |
| Awaiting approval |
Once an object has been submitted for approval, this State will be displayed. |
| Responded |
Applied to an object as soon as a response is published on an object. |
| Closed (thread) |
Applied to all but the newest message in a conversation thread. Read more about this here. |
Searching based on States
To search for objects based on their State, add the search filter Current State to your Deep Dive, selecting the State/s you’re looking for (or select all — except those you’re not — if you’re wanting to exclude them from your search).
Workflow states
That's it for workflow states! If you have any further questions, please don’t hesitate to contact Lexer Support at support@lexer.io.
