To make an approval process more flexible, you can separate the approvers set making their decisions mandatory and non-mandatory.
A mandatory approver can either Approve or Reject the approval task; the non-mandatory approver can either ignore or Reject a task optionally.
Flexible approvals are configured via User-approval workflow activity.
Configuring participants
In general, to configure participants, please specify the approval conditions in the Approval block in your workflow.
To specify mandatory participants, please complete the following steps:
Scroll down to the Mandatory Participants tab of the User-approval block properties.
- Fill in either the Employees, Groups or Roles fields.
- Define the approval logic in the Approved When field. Available options:
- Anyone to approve – one of the users specified can approve; the first received approval causes the activity to complete with the result of Approved.
- Everyone to approve – all the users must approve. If one of the participants rejects the ticket, the approval state changes to Cancelled. The first received rejection causes the activity to complete with the result of Rejected.
- First response from anyone – the first received approval causes the activity to complete with the result of Approved.
- Most answers – the activity will be completed with the Approved result if the quantity of approvals is more than the rejection quantity.
- Conditions based on script – each time a user approves or rejects, the Script is called to determine if the activity should complete.
If your process requires non-mandatory participants involvement, please complete the steps below:
- Select the Non-Mandatory Participants checkbox when configuring your User-approval block properties. The Non-mandatory participants tab appears.
- Fill in the fields.
- You can fill in either the Employees, Groups or Roles fields.
- Select the Consider non-mandatory participants checkbox to make participants able to affect the decision and reject approvals.
Participant properties
The participant properties differ slightly for mandatory and non-mandatory participant in a particular process or task (for example, Change Request authorization).
| Participants | Participant properties |
|---|---|
| Mandatory | Their reaction is mandatory to authorize a request. When a mandatory approver receives an approval request, they can:
|
| Non-mandatory | Their reaction is not mandatory for authorization. When a non-mandatory approver receives an approval request and if they were involved in the process, they can:
|
You can configure your approval rules so that the first reject from a non-mandatory participant will cancel the approval process. For this, you need to use the options listed below in your User-approval block:
- The Non-mandatory participants checkbox is selected.
- Participants taking part in the approval process are chosen (whether specified employees or user groups or user roles).
- The Consider non-mandatory participants checkbox is selected.
Example of business usage
Approvals flexibility serves well, for example, in business-cases requiring a case-by-case approach, such as Change Enablement Practice.
When authorizing a change request, mandatory and non-mandatory approvers can take part in the approval process.
Both mandatory and non-mandatory approvers can be classified according to the RACI matrix.
RACI Matrix
| Procedure | Process Manager (for example, Change Manager) | Mandatory approver | Non-Mandatory approver |
|---|---|---|---|
| Approval | A | R | I, R |
The process manager is accountable for the whole process, so they are marked with A in the table.
Mandatory approvers are responsible for the request implementation, so they are marked with R in the table.
Non-mandatory approvers generally should be informed but may be responsible for one or more implementation stages, so they are marked with I and R.
