Audience
- Operations, sales and administration professionals improving repetitive processes.
- Analysts and digital project staff connecting existing business tools.
- Developers who want a practical introduction to visual workflow orchestration.
AI & technology
n8n & AI Automation
Design connected workflows that reduce repetitive work and integrate AI into business processes.
Learning with a practical purpose.
Design practical automations that connect business systems and reduce repeated manual handling. This module follows an enquiry from initial receipt through validation, routing and follow-up, using n8n as a visual workflow environment. You will learn how data moves between steps and how to make the process understandable to the people who operate it.
The course moves beyond a successful demonstration to the situations that matter in daily work: duplicate submissions, missing fields, temporary failures and actions that require approval. You will introduce AI only where it supports a defined task, such as classifying an enquiry or preparing a draft, then validate its output before the workflow continues.
Live onlineTeaching through Kent Business College, UK
2 hoursOne live session each teaching week
14 sessionsA semester for each module
28 live hoursPer module, plus independent study
The outline below is a 14-session online module, with one two-hour live session each teaching week. Reading weeks, breaks and additional activities follow the agreed cohort calendar. The cohort syllabus, full route, dates, fees, independent study and assessment requirements are confirmed before enrolment.
Who this module is designed for.
Starting knowledge and preparation
- Confidence using spreadsheets and web applications.
- Basic understanding of forms, records and business process steps.
- Introductory JSON knowledge is helpful; coding experience is not essential.
What you will work towards.
- Map a business process into a clear automation design with named owners.
- Build n8n workflows using triggers, data transformations and application connections.
- Validate input and prevent common duplication or repeated-action problems.
- Add bounded AI steps with structured outputs and appropriate human review.
- Test, document and monitor a workflow so another person can operate it.
Explore the 14-session learning plan.
Explore the focus and practical output of each teaching session. Open individual sessions below, or expand the complete plan.
Session 01 Selecting an automation opportunity
Map a repeated business task and estimate its volume, exceptions and intended improvement before building.
Practical output: An automation opportunity brief.
Session 02 Navigating workflow execution
Explore triggers, nodes and execution data by building a small workflow with visible intermediate results.
Practical output: A first documented workflow.
Session 03 Working with JSON and expressions
Read structured input, transform fields and handle missing values without silently changing their meaning.
Practical output: A tested data-transformation exercise.
Session 04 Forms, webhooks and incoming events
Receive an event, validate required fields and return clear feedback to the initiating system.
Practical output: A validated enquiry intake.
Session 05 Connecting applications and credentials
Configure an approved integration and separate connection credentials from the data passing through the workflow.
Practical output: A controlled application connection.
Session 06 Routing and business rules
Use conditions and branches to route enquiries according to explicit criteria and exception rules.
Practical output: A routing workflow and decision table.
Session 07 Calling an external API
Send a structured request, inspect the response and handle unsuccessful status codes and missing fields.
Practical output: An API-connected workflow step.
Session 08 Duplicates and repeated execution
Choose a stable identifier and design checks that prevent a retried event from creating repeated work.
Practical output: A duplicate-handling test set.
Session 09 Adding a bounded AI task
Classify or summarise an enquiry using a constrained prompt and validate the result before routing.
Practical output: An evaluated AI-assisted workflow branch.
Session 10 Human review before consequential actions
Pause for an approval decision and define what happens when a request is rejected or unanswered.
Practical output: An approval and escalation workflow.
Session 11 Errors, retries and recovery
Simulate a failed integration and distinguish safe retries from actions that need manual intervention.
Practical output: A failure-handling and recovery routine.
Session 12 Testing and operating the workflow
Exercise realistic and difficult cases, inspect execution history and define useful monitoring signals.
Practical output: A workflow test report and monitoring plan.
Session 13 Enquiry-to-follow-up project
Combine intake, routing, storage and approved follow-up into a coherent workflow with clear operational ownership.
Practical output: A complete enquiry automation.
Session 14 Handover and improvement review
Demonstrate recovery from failure and explain which measurements would show whether the automation is worthwhile.
Practical output: An operational runbook and improvement proposal.
Apply the learning
An enquiry-to-follow-up automation
Build a workflow that receives an enquiry, checks the data, classifies the request and records the next action. Include a review step before an external communication or other consequential action. Demonstrate how the workflow responds to duplicates, incomplete submissions and a temporarily unavailable integration.
Your project evidence can include
- A process map and business-rules table.
- An exportable workflow with documented configuration.
- Test cases, recovery instructions and a monitoring checklist.
Use anonymised, public or suitable synthetic material where workplace information is confidential. The issued assessment brief confirms the required evidence.
Assessment, feedback and certification.
- Weekly exercises assess data handling, integration and branching decisions.
- The project is reviewed through normal, duplicate and failure scenarios.
- A handover discussion checks whether another colleague could operate and troubleshoot the workflow.
Teaching and the relevant course certificate are provided through Kent Business College in the UK. Completion requirements are set out in the module information; attendance alone should not be assumed to meet every assessment requirement.
Questions worth asking.
Do I need to write code?
Most activities use visual workflow steps. You will learn expressions and structured data, with small code examples where they clarify a practical need.
Will the course automate my live systems?
The core work uses a controlled teaching setup. Connecting production systems requires organisational permission, appropriate credentials and a reviewed rollout plan.
Is AI required in every workflow?
No. Deterministic rules remain useful. The module shows where AI adds value and how to compare it with a simpler rule-based step.