Choosing a Workflow Action

Every rule's Then step — and its optional Otherwise step — needs at least one action. This article is a quick index to help you pick the right one; click through to any action below for full configuration details.

Where actions live in a rule

From either Then (required) or Otherwise (optional), click + Add Action. You'll see all six action types laid out as cards:

Action	Use it to...
Tag Submission	Add, remove, or replace tags on a submission
Set Field Value	Write a value into a hidden (admin-only) form field
Total & Set Field Value	Add up several numeric fields and save the total into a hidden field
Assign to a Review Phase	Move a submission into (or out of) a review phase
Assign a Follow-up	File a submission into a follow-up (child) award
Send Email	Send a personalized email tied to the submission

Click a card to configure that action. If you picked the wrong one, use Change action at any time to go back and choose a different type without losing your place in the rule.

You can add more than one action to a single Then or Otherwise step — click + Add another action to stack additional actions after the first.

A few things that apply to every action

Then vs. Otherwise: Every action type works identically whether you're configuring it under Then (for submissions that match your conditions) or Otherwise (for submissions that don't). There's no difference in the setup — only in which branch of the rule it lives in.
Multiple actions run together: If you add more than one action to a Then (or Otherwise) step, all of them run for a matching submission — not just the first one.
Order within a step doesn't currently matter for most actions, since they act on independent parts of a submission (a tag, a field, a phase, an email). The one exception worth knowing: if you use both Assign to a Review Phase and Send Email together and the email content references the phase, make sure the phase assignment is what you expect — both actions run as part of the same rule execution.

Which article do I want?

Automating tags → Tag Submission
Recording internal, hidden data → Set Field Value or Total & Set Field Value
Moving submissions through review → Assign to a Review Phase
Assigning a followup program → Assign a Follow-up
Notifying an applicant → Send Email

What's next

Once your action is configured and your rule is saved, head to Running, Managing & Reordering Workflows to turn the workflow on, or Understanding Execution Logs & Troubleshooting Workflows to confirm it ran as expected.