# Describe business activities

Create an activity, qualify its criticality and link its vendors.

> **Access:** activity creation. Subject to enabled modules and your plan.

A business activity describes a process your organization wants to track, such as “Order processing”. It links vendors to a business need.

## Prerequisites

Activity-creation permission is required to add an activity. Prepare its description, owner and supporting vendors.

## Create an activity

1. Open **Registers → Business activities** and select **Create activity**.
2. Enter the name and requested context.
3. Qualify criticality at the dedicated step.
4. Select the supporting vendors. Missing relationships will not appear on the dependency map.
5. Check the offered access settings and finish creation.

![Creating a business activity](https://docs.cisapp.eu/images/en/activity-create.webp)

*The wizard starts by identifying the business process being tracked. · [Open full-size screenshot](https://docs.cisapp.eu/images/en/activity-create.webp)*

## Keep the activity up to date

Open its record from the register to review information and relationships. When a vendor changes, also update the activities it supports. An **Business Criticality** assessment can qualify a scope using a questionnaire.

## Expected outcome

The activity exists in the register and its dependencies can support [reporting](https://docs.cisapp.eu/en/reporting/dependencies).

## Distinguish the concepts

Business activities and GDPR processing activities serve different purposes. To describe personal-data processing, use the [GDPR register](https://docs.cisapp.eu/en/compliance/gdpr).