CtrlProcesses · Elements.cloud process maps inside M-Files

One map, used three ways

When you are doing the work

Find your step and its procedure is right there, along with the form for a new complaint, change request or non-conformance. You think about the job in hand, and the map knows where the documents are.

When the auditor asks

Each step shows the standards it answers to: ISO 9001, GDPR, or whichever you work under. Behind the step, the clauses are listed beside the procedure, so "show me where you handle this" has an answer.

When you own the process

A green, amber or red light on a step shows how it is performing, driven by your own measurements. You can also see which processes people open, and which ones they leave alone.

Every step opens what lies behind it

A complaint-handling process, the way your people would meet it in M‑Files.

The information panel of the step Assess severity and contain beside a process map in the CtrlProcesses viewer. It lists a procedure marked Open Document in M-Files, an expanded note about severity 1 complaints, a link to a view of open complaints, a link marked Create New Object in M-Files and the heading of a data table. A Raise Issue button sits in the toolbar.

Everything the step needs, beside the diagram

Open a step and a panel appears beside the diagram, so the process stays in view while you work. From the panel, documents open in M‑Files, a view lists the live cases and a link starts a new record of the right kind. Notes hold the practical guidance, with pictures and video where they help.

Fill in a record on the spot through a step's data table, where you allow it.
An issue can be raised against a process from the diagram itself.

A seven-step complaint-handling process in the CtrlProcesses viewer, flowing from Register the complaint to Close the complaint with labelled flow lines. Each step shows its RASCI roles, paperclip and data-table icons, a GDPR or 9001 flag, and three steps carry a red or green status light. A key names the two reference models.

See who does what at every step

The diagram looks the way your process team drew it, in your own colours. Each step names the roles involved, with a flag for every standard it answers to and, where you measure it, a status light. A step with a diagram of its own leads straight into it.

Switch between published releases to see the process as it stood.
The process owner and the author are named in the header.
Go full screen for a walkthrough in the meeting room.

Watch a process map at work in M‑Files

Book a CtrlProcesses demo

Your processes are records in the vault

The maps arrive in M‑Files as records of their own, next to your documents and customer records, so you can link to them and search them like everything else in the vault.

A record finds its step on the map

Open a complaint or a non-conformance and you can go straight to its diagram, centred on the step it belongs to. You choose which kinds of record work this way.

Find processes by role or standard

Each diagram lists the roles and standards its steps involve, so finding every process the quality manager takes part in, or every one that touches GDPR, is an ordinary M‑Files search.

Every change tied to a release

Each diagram records the release that last changed it, and each release lists what it changed. When someone asks what changed in March, the release tells them.

In Teams as well

The same diagrams open in Microsoft Teams, where the team already talks about the work.

Draw it in Elements, see it in M‑Files

Your process team keeps working in Elements.cloud. What they publish turns up in M‑Files on its own.

Your team publishes a release

They draw and maintain the maps in Elements.cloud as they do today, and publish a release when the changes are ready.
CtrlProcesses picks up what changed

On a schedule, it reads the diagrams that changed in the new release and leaves the rest alone.
The vault stays tidy

Only real changes are written, so diagrams and steps do not pile up versions.
Records stay put if Elements misfires

If Elements sends back something empty or broken, the vault keeps everything it has.
M‑Files shows the map your team published

Everyone works from the current release and can look back at earlier ones.

What it needs to run

Any M‑Files edition, in M‑Files Cloud or on-premise, with M‑Files 25.1 or later on the server and in the clients.
The classic M‑Files desktop client, the new desktop client or M‑Files Web. There is also a Microsoft Teams app.
Elements.cloud, where the process maps are drawn and maintained.
An M‑Files administrator, who sets up the standards flags, the status lights, the kinds of record a step can create and which records lead back to their step.
It is installed as a vault application in M‑Files Admin.

The set-up guide is in the CtrlProcesses documentation.

See your own process run from the map

Tell us what someone needs today to follow one of your processes: the map, the procedure, the form, the colleague who knows. We show you how the same work runs from one diagram in M‑Files.

Book a demo Ask for a 30-day trial

Questions about CtrlProcesses

We already have the maps in Elements.cloud. What does this add?

It puts them where the work is done. People open the diagram in the M‑Files client they use every day, and a step leads straight to the controlled procedure, a view of live records or a new record of the right kind. The process content also becomes records in the vault, so documents and records can point at the step they belong to, and processes can be searched like anything else.

Where do the diagrams come from?

Elements.cloud. CtrlProcesses synchronises Elements process content into the vault as records of their own: maps, diagrams, activities, resources, reference models and releases. The viewer draws the diagrams inside M‑Files in their Elements colours.

Will the synchronisation fill the vault with versions?

No. CtrlProcesses writes a diagram or step when its fields have changed and leaves the rest as they are, so an unchanged record gains no version. In a test over 30 diagrams and 286 activities, a repeat run went from about 1,200 vault round trips to 6.

What happens if Elements returns nothing, or returns rubbish?

The vault keeps everything it has: an empty or broken reply from Elements removes nothing. The synchronisation's progress shows in the M‑Files dashboard, and anything that reappears in Elements is restored in the vault.

Can people change data from the diagram?

Where you allow it. People can read a step's data table in full and, when the table permits it, add a record through a form. Records created from a step are made by M‑Files itself, so each person's vault permissions apply.

How is this different from CtrlDocs for Elements?

They run in opposite directions. CtrlProcesses brings Elements process content into M‑Files and draws the diagrams there. CtrlDocs for Elements publishes approved PDFs from M‑Files into the Elements URL library, so the two are complementary.

How mature is it, and is there a trial?

The first release was in October 2020, and the viewer was rebuilt for the new M‑Files Web in June 2025. The current version, 1.26.9.14, shipped in September 2026. Every CtrlDocs product comes with a 30-day trial. Tell us where your process maps are today and we answer the same working day.

More CtrlDocs add-ons for M‑Files

CtrlPortals

Dashboards and UI that make M‑Files yours

Record pages, forms, boards and dashboards inside M‑Files, set up around your own records for any process. Open a project, a customer or a document and see everything that belongs to it.

See CtrlPortals

CtrlShare

Co-author in Office on any M‑Files, cloud or on-premise

Open an M‑Files document for colleagues and outside parties to edit together, in desktop Office or the browser. It comes back to M‑Files as a new version.

See CtrlShare

CtrlScout

AI for your M‑Files vault, cloud or on-premise

Ask your M‑Files vault in plain words. CtrlScout finds the records, counts and charts them, summarises documents, drafts the email and suggests the details for a new document. It only sees what you can see.

See CtrlScout

CtrlTeams

Microsoft Teams, governed from M‑Files

Start a project in M‑Files and its team in Microsoft Teams is ready, with the right people in it and your folders and templates in place. What they write there is kept in M‑Files.

See CtrlTeams

CtrlSync

Teams and SharePoint, filed with metadata and rights

People work in Teams or SharePoint, and the documents you want kept are copied to M‑Files with metadata, filed under their project with the access rights preserved.

See CtrlSync

CtrlConnect

M‑Files details, right inside Teams and Outlook

An M‑Files link pasted into Teams or Outlook shows the record's title and description, and in Teams it comes with buttons that open the record. You can also search M‑Files from the Teams chat, on a phone too.

See CtrlConnect