Have you ever needed to work in forms with information that you would like to convert into subitems like managing purchase orders, swags or samples?
I’m Pedro, I am a monday.com certified partner and project manager who supports companies implementing advanced workflows within monday.com and providing consultation and training .
In this article I’m going to describe an interesting approach that I have implemented in several companies to manage Purchase Orders, Samples or similar processes when you need to create items and subitems at the same time receiving them from a form.
When the requirement is to only add the details of the form at an item level then you can utilize the cool standard forms by monday.com.
However, if it requires for subitems to be added, then I have an alternative way on how to go about it with the use of JotForm and Integromat.
How to set up the workflow:
1. Configure the monday board
The board configuration will be the basis of the form. For each field on the form, there has to be an equivalent column that will receive the information whether at an item or subitem level.
2. Build a form with JotForm
Once the monday board is ready you can create a form in JotForm. You can use many of the widgets thay JotForm provides, I will focus on how to create subitems.
You will find a link to the following forms at the end of the article if you want to reuse them.
There are two main ways to configure the form on JotForm to be able to work with subitems:
A) Use a pre-defined table – To input a subitem information, one has to type it. Columns on the table may be changed depending on. This approach is best if the requests contain many items that vary regularly.
B) Use a dropdown to add subitem details – Subitems are already added as dropdown selection and one will just have to choose which one to use based on the requirement. If the inventory doesn’t change often then this approach is best to be incorporated on the form. This way, it saves more time in choosing an item.
You can test both approaches and select the one it fits better for your use case.
3. Setup the integration using Integromat
Instead of using the built-in monday integration in connecting your monday account and JotForm, Integromat will be utilized instead so the subitems can be created when the form is received.
Working with subitems in forms use cases
Use Case 1: Purchase order process with the form
The first approach is to manage Purchase orders, Invoices or similar workflows to manage or approve them within monday.com, having all the information populated in the relevant columns to be able to get insights or use it in other stages of the process.
The first part of the form will look like this one, gathering the main information to show at item level.
For this use case, the pre-defined table is used to capture the items that will be added as subitems on the monday.com board where purchase order requests are managed.
The last page of the form is where the contact details are added. After the submission of the form, a new item will be created on the board with the subitems.
Separate boards are created for Project Directory, Suppliers Directory, Contacts – these boards are all connected to the Purchase Order Management board. The connection and interaction among these boards are setup using various monday.com automation recipes.
Use Case 2: Swag/Sample order process
Many Marketing or Manufacturing companies among others work with swags or samples to send to their clients or leads for assessment. Usually the same request may contain several articles so using the subitems is a good approach for tracking this type of requests.
Below is the workflow in managing swag request and sending the information to a monday.com board:
The input of the requests is done using JotForm, then Integromat sends the information to the monday.com board. Other applications such as Google Mail for sending emails or Docupilot for documentation can be integrated to the whole setup.
In this use case, a dropdown widget is used on the form to add the items that will be shown on the monday board as subitems.
Once all the details on the form are provided, once submitted, it will show on the board as the image below:
Several boards are connected to the Swags/Sample Request Management board like the Departments board, Contacts board, Suppliers Directory board, Inventory board, and the Purchase Order Management board.
Automations across the boards mentioned are set up to automatically show relevant information. For instance, to show how many items are on the Inventory for a specific item, the Inventory column “In Stock” is mirrored as a subitem column named as “Left” on the Swags/Sample Request Management board.
I hope it may serve you as inspiration on how to create subitems from forms. If you want a copy of the forms or you need more information about how to implement any of these processes you can check this link.