Handeling locked objects during background steps in workflows.

[ezra]

Hello,
I have a workflow for projects approval.
The actual approval steps takes place while activating user\system statuses of the project (Transaction CJ20N).
I use decision steps followed by background steps to set the status by ABAP code,
this may cause problems when one user is working on the project using the CJ20N transaction, and the other user is using the decision step to approve the project.
This situation may cause data\flow inconsistencies.
 
How can I use the standard locking mechanism during the workflow to wait until the project is unlocked and only then run my ABAP code to set the statuses?
I thought about placing a wait step right before a background (status change) step, that will listen to an UNLOCK event of the project object, or something like that,
Is there a better way to do that ? Is there a standard mechanism in the workflow system that knows how to handle these kind of situations ?
 
Thank you,
Elad.