A practical guide to the identity, evidence, status, ownership and exception rules that field-to-office handoffs need.
Control boundaryNo completed status without usable evidence, a named exception owner and an explicit next action.
The field team can do its job well. The office can do its job well. The operation can still fail in the gap between them.
That gap is where a photograph loses its context, a status changes in one system but not another, or an exception is settled in a message and never returns to the job record. Each team appears productive. Management is left without a reliable answer to a simple question: what can happen next?
A handoff is a management control, not a transfer button. It should give the next person a recognisable job, usable evidence, an operational status, a named exception owner and an explicit next action. When one part is missing, the workflow has transferred uncertainty rather than work.
Begin with a recent job, not a process diagram drawn from memory. Follow it from planning to site and back to the office. Choose an ordinary case first, then repeat the exercise with one that went offline, arrived incomplete or needed approval.
Look at the records people actually used:
The management question is not whether the field form was submitted. It is whether the next person received enough controlled evidence to make the next decision without reconstructing the work from private messages.
A dependable handoff has six parts. Together they form a contract between the field activity and the office decision. The contract states what must be returned, what makes it acceptable and what happens when it is not.
Every item crossing the handoff needs a stable reference that both sides recognise. Names, addresses and map locations can help a person recognise the work, but they are weak joins between systems. They change, repeat and invite interpretation.
Choose the identifier at the grain of the decision. If the office approves a work order, return the work-order reference. If it decides by asset, carry both the job and asset identifiers. A photograph named with an address is not reliably attached evidence when several visits or assets share that address.
A status should describe the operational position, not simply that somebody pressed a button. “Submitted” may mean the field team has finished its part. It does not mean the evidence is complete, accepted or ready for the next stage.
Define each important state in ordinary language. State who may enter it, what evidence is required, which transition follows and whether the change is provisional or authoritative. Useful distinctions often include field complete, received, under review, accepted, correction required, revisit required and cancelled.
State what evidence is required and what makes it usable. A photograph may need the job reference, evidence type, capture time and location. A measurement needs its unit, method and applicable asset. A declaration needs the person responsible and the version of the question they answered.
Preserve the original item as well as any office interpretation. A caption, classification or extracted value should point back to the source rather than replace it.
Record when the work happened, when the evidence was captured, when the device sent it and when the office received it. These events are often different.
Time matters when a permit, access window, service level or customer commitment can expire. It also locates delay. A capture-to-transfer gap points to connectivity or device behaviour; a received-to-decision gap points to the office queue or missing authority.
When the normal route fails, name the role that acts next. “Send back to operations” is a destination, not ownership.
The owner needs the original evidence, the failed rule, the current state and the action required. They also need authority: a coordinator may request a clearer photograph while only a manager can accept an exception to a controlled requirement.
The handoff should make the next action explicit. The office may accept the work, ask for a correction, arrange a revisit, seek approval or stop the route. A status that describes the past without directing the next decision leaves the workflow unfinished.
Create a small source-authority map for the handoff:
When two sources disagree, apply an agreed precedence for that fact or preserve the conflict for resolution. The latest timestamp is not automatically the authoritative record.
The Government Data Quality Framework treats completeness, uniqueness, consistency, timeliness, validity and accuracy as distinct dimensions. A handoff can pass one and fail another: the evidence may arrive quickly but be attached to the wrong job, or be valid in form but incomplete for the decision.
The W3C provenance model gives a useful structure for retaining entities, activities and agents. In practical terms, keep the evidence, what happened to it and the people or systems responsible for each change.
Decide before the device loses connection:
The field worker should be able to distinguish “saved on this device” from “received by the office”. The office should be able to see that expected evidence is still pending. Both views matter; neither is proof of the other.
An unavailable office system needs the same discipline. If somebody records an approval in a temporary channel, retain the job reference, decision, authority, time and evidence basis. Return that decision to the controlled record when service is restored. Otherwise the workaround becomes an invisible second system.
Mobile retries, repeated submissions and delayed synchronisation can make valid events arrive twice or in the wrong order. A simple “last write wins” rule can replace a correct status with an older one.
Give each submission or event a stable identifier. Retain capture, transfer and receipt time to distinguish a delayed original event from a genuinely new one. Deduplicate by identity and business meaning.
Where sequence matters, define the valid transitions. A job accepted by the office should not quietly return to “field complete” because an older device event arrived later. Hold the event, show the conflict and give a named role the evidence needed to reconcile it.
The SIREN portfolio record shows how source health, identity gaps and uncertainty can remain visible in an investigation. It is private Strataflow portfolio work using controlled evidence, not a published client outcome.
The handoff is complete only when the office decision returns to the job record.
Reconciliation should answer:
The following is a reusable operating template, not a client record. Complete it for one decision before designing screens or integrations.
Scroll horizontally to view all columns.
| Contract element | Definition to agree | Example form of the answer |
|---|---|---|
| Job identity | The authoritative reference and the grain of the work | Work-order ID plus asset ID |
| Current status | The position the field team is asserting | Field complete, awaiting validation |
| Evidence package | Required items and acceptance rules | Two typed photographs, measurement with unit, signed declaration |
| Time | Capture, transfer and receipt events | Capture time from device; receipt time from office service |
| Source authority | The system or role owning each fact | Planner owns instruction; office validator owns acceptance |
| Exception owner | The role acting when a rule fails | Field supervisor for evidence correction |
| Next action | Action, owner and acceptance condition | Validator accepts or returns with one named correction |
| Decision record | What must return to the controlled job | Decision, reviewer, time, evidence version and reason |
Test the template with a clean job, an incomplete job, an offline job and a conflicting status. If the answers change by circumstance, state the rule rather than relying on local judgement.
Management needs measures that expose where the contract fails, not merely how many forms were submitted.
Scroll horizontally to view all columns.
| Management question | Useful measure |
|---|---|
| Did the office receive a decision-ready handoff? | Share accepted without clarification or evidence repair |
| Where is work waiting? | Age by handoff state and named exception owner |
| Does offline work return safely? | Count and age of unsynchronised or unreconciled jobs |
| Is evidence being corrected repeatedly? | Correction cycles by evidence type and failure reason |
| How long does the decision take? | Field-complete to office-decision time, with transfer and queue time separate |
| Does the record contain the decision? | Decisions missing reviewer, authority, evidence version or reason |
A low exception count may mean the control is working or that failed cases are hidden. Reconcile a sample of accepted work against the original field evidence.
Workarounds can make weak handoffs look normal:
These situations identify the rule, integration or responsibility that needs repair. The smallest useful change may be a stable identifier, a visible pending state or a controlled route back from the office.
The normal handoff is only half the workflow. Define what happens when the job reference is missing, required evidence cannot be captured, two systems disagree, the device cannot connect, the evidence is ambiguous or nobody present has authority.
Keep the failed condition with the job. Route it with the original evidence and failed rule. Record who accepted, corrected or rejected the case. When the issue is solved outside the main system, return the decision and its basis to the controlled record.
Automation becomes useful after these rules exist. Until then it moves ambiguity faster and makes the resulting backlog harder to explain.
Use one real job to answer:
The Field Workflow Review follows this route over five days. Field Systems & Geospatial covers the system or integration work when the review shows that a build is justified.
Continue the operating sequence
Define which source owns each number, expose missing or conflicting records and make the result ready for a management meeting.
Read the guideBound the evidence, preserve the model suggestion and leave consequential decisions with an accountable person.
Read the guideFrom guidance to action
The useful starting point is one job, report or handoff that the current process cannot handle cleanly.
