Approval definitions

In some cases, approvals must be granted at certain phases of the workflow before moving on to the next phase. The following table provides details.

How to build an approval plan

There are the following ways available for you to build an approval plan:

• The Approval tab of a record

  For more information about how to build an approval plan, see How to build a task/approval plan.

• Approval definitions tab in Administration

  From the main menu, select Administration > Configuration > Records, and select the record type.

  • For article, change, idea, proposal, release and request record types, this tab enables you to build an approval plan definition and apply it to records of the same type.

  • For article, change, idea, proposal, request, and release record types, this tab enables you to add an approval definition as the Governance Level Approval.  

    For more information about governance level approval, see Governance Level Approval.

How to view the approval plan definitions

1. From the main menu, select Administration > Configuration > Records.

2. In the records module, select the record type.
3. Click the Approval definitions tab. The approval definitions are listed in the left pane.

The Approval definitions tab is available for the following record types:

Article

You need to build your own approval plan. For more information about how to build an approval plan, see How to build a task/approval plan.

Change

The approval phases of the normal and emergency change workflows have pre-defined approval plans. When you create a change, the approval plan corresponding to the selected change type is selected in the Approval definition field in the Properties tab for each approval phase:

Change type	Approval Phase	Built-in approval plan
Normal	Approve Plan	Normal change - Approve plan
	Approve deployment	Normal change - Approve deployment
Emergency	ECAB	Emergency Change – ECAB
Standard	No approval phase	N/A

Note You can change the governance level approval for each phase in the Properties panel for the phase.

1. From the Main menu, select Administration > Configuration > Records.

2. Select Change in the drop-down list at the top of the page.

3. Click the Processes and Rules tab.

4. In the Workflow map, select the appropriate phase.

5. In the Properties panel, select the approval definition from the drop-down list.

Idea

You need to build your own approval plan. For more information about how to build an approval plan, see How to build a task/approval plan.

Proposal

You need to build your own approval plan. For more information about how to build an approval plan, see How to build a task/approval plan.

Release

Release workflows also have an out-of-the-box pre-defined approval definition: Release – Approve Deployment. When you create a release record, this approval plan is applied by default in the Approve deployment phase.

Request

Out-of-the-box, there is an empty approval definition for the request record type. You need to build your own approval plan. This approval plan is used in the Approve phase for cart and service processes. For more information, see Governance Level Approval.

Note Approval definitions are not relevant for support requests.

After the approval plan is built into the records, you can edit the plan as desired. For more information, see How to build a task/approval plan.

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