Building a workflow
The node canvas for calls whose steps have to happen in order. Seven node types, five templates, two ways to generate one, and one control that decides whether any of it reaches a live call.
9 min readUpdated 26 August 2026
A single prompt lets the agent work out how to get through a call. A workflow makes the order real: this question, then that one, and this branch when the answer is no.
There is a separate article on which of the two your call actually needs. This one assumes you have decided and want to build.
First: put the agent into edit mode
This is the step that wastes the most time, because nothing on screen explains it until you look closely. Open the Workflow panel on an agent you are only viewing and the four controls in its header, Templates, Generate, Sync to instructions and Save & attach, are all greyed out. The canvas will not accept a node either.
The header tells you why, quietly, next to the step count: edit the agent to save. The whole builder is read-only until the agent is in edit mode.
- Open the agent.
- Click the three-dot menu at the top right, next to Talk to your agent.
- Choose Edit Agent.
- Open More to configure and then Workflow.
Careful
If Templates and Generate are grey and the canvas ignores you, you are not looking at a broken feature. You are viewing the agent rather than editing it.
The canvas
The panel header carries the workflow name area, a step count, and the four controls. Bottom left of the canvas has zoom in, zoom out and fit-to-view. Top right has Expand, which takes the builder full screen, and Esc brings you back.
Expand it before you build anything of length. A flow of any size is unreadable in the short panel, and a flow you cannot see is a flow you cannot check.
Tip
The canvas prints its own instruction along the bottom of the palette: connect a node's bottom dot to another's top dot to link steps. That is how edges are made, by dragging from dot to dot.
The seven node types
In edit mode a palette appears down the left under the heading DRAG ONTO CANVAS. Each entry has a drag handle on its right. These seven are the whole vocabulary of a NexaVoxa workflow.
| Node | What it is for |
|---|---|
| Agent says | The agent speaks and moves on. Greetings, confirmations, closing lines |
| Agent asks | The agent puts a question and waits. The inspector prompts you with what should the agent ask |
| Caller answers | The caller's turn. It sits under an Agent asks node and represents the reply |
| Branch | The flow splits, so different answers take different paths |
| Tool / action | The agent does something rather than says something: a tool from its Added Tools list |
| Transfer | The call leaves the agent, to a number or to another agent |
| End call | The call finishes here |
Agent asks and Caller answers are a pair, which is why a generated flow has roughly twice as many nodes as it has steps. The step count in the header counts the agent's own steps and not the caller-turn nodes sitting between them.
Branch is the node that earns a workflow its keep. If your call never splits, you have built a list, and a single prompt would have run that list with less to maintain.
Editing a node
Click any node on the canvas and an inspector opens down the right. It shows the node type in small capitals at the top, a delete icon beside it, and the field for that node's content.
Under the field sits the line that matters most on the whole panel: edits apply when you Save & attach. You can rewrite every node on the canvas and the live agent will keep behaving exactly as it did before.
Four ways to start
An empty canvas states the options itself: drag a node from the left, pick a Template, or Generate one from instructions or a prompt.
| Route | Best when |
|---|---|
| Drag nodes | You know exactly what the flow is and want to build it deliberately |
| Template | Your call is a common shape and you want a working start |
| Generate from instructions | You already have a prompt that describes the steps |
| Generate from a prompt | You can describe the flow in words but have not written the instructions |
Templates
The Templates menu opens under the heading Start from a template and offers five, each with its shape written underneath.
Tip
A template is a starting shape, not an answer. Every one of these needs your wording, your branches and your tools before it is worth attaching.
| Template | Shape |
|---|---|
| Appointment booking | Greet, collect details, confirm |
| Lead qualification | Need, budget, timeline, handoff |
| Customer support triage | Describe issue, identify, log |
| Feedback survey (CSAT) | Rate, why, thank |
| Order status lookup | Order number, anything else, close |
Generate
The Generate menu holds two options rather than one, and the difference is where the words come from.
Tip
Generating from your existing instructions is usually the fastest honest start. Your prompt already contains the steps, and seeing them drawn out is what shows you the branch you forgot.
| Option | What the menu says |
|---|---|
| From instructions | Use this agent's current instructions |
| From a prompt... | Describe the flow in your own words |
Sync to instructions
This control exists because of the failure mode the feature has: a flow and a prompt that no longer agree. It reads the flow and produces instructions that describe it, so the two stay in step.
Once a workflow drives the call, instructions that still describe a different sequence are worse than useless. They mislead whoever reads them next, including you in three months.
Save and attach
Save & attach is the control that puts the workflow on the agent. Everything before it, dragging nodes, applying a template, generating, editing text, lives on the canvas only.
This is the same pattern as the rest of the agent page and it is the right way round: edit freely, then commit.
Keep it as small as it can be
Every node is a place a real caller can fail to fit. Flows grow easily and shrink painfully, so add a step only when you have heard a call that needed it.
The good test after building one is to walk it as an awkward caller: someone who answers two questions at once, who does not have the information you are asking for, who changes their mind halfway. If the flow has nowhere for them to go, that is what a real call will find.
Common questions
- Templates and Generate are greyed out. Is the feature broken?
- No. The workflow builder is read-only until the agent is in edit mode. Open the three-dot menu at the top right of the agent and choose Edit Agent, and all four controls become active.
- There is no node palette on the left.
- Same cause. The DRAG ONTO CANVAS palette only appears in edit mode.
- Do I need a workflow?
- Only if the steps genuinely have to happen in order, and ideally only if the call branches. Most agents do not need one, and a single prompt is easier to change and easier to debug.
- How do I connect two nodes?
- Drag from the dot at the bottom of one node to the dot at the top of the next. The canvas states this itself under the palette.
- Why does my flow have more nodes than steps?
- Agent asks and Caller answers come as a pair. The step count in the header counts the agent's own steps, not the caller-turn nodes between them.
- Does editing the canvas change live calls immediately?
- No. Save & attach is what puts it on the agent, and the node inspector says so directly: edits apply when you Save & attach.
- What does Sync to instructions do?
- It writes instructions that match the flow, so your prompt and your flow do not end up describing two different calls.
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