Configuring Approval

Owned by Enterprise IT
Last updated: Apr 23, 2024 by Mayuresh Balaji Kamble (Unlicensed)Version comment
7 min read

SummitAI Service Management Help

Incident Management


You can configure a new approval workflow using Approval configuration for the resolved incident. An approval workflow will send the email notifications to the approvers as per the configuration.

The Approval workflow configuration automates, streamlines, and provides easy implementation of the whole approval process.

Figure: Post Resolution Approval Process Workflow

Scenario: Three levels of approval

In this scenario, Fredrick, an administrator for Acme Services, wants to configure an approval for a resolved incident. The resolved incident should meet the all of the following conditions to kick-start the configured approval workflow. 

Conditions:

Incident caller location is Hyderabad.

Incident Priority is P2.

Incident Impact is High.

This approval requires the approvals of the Reporting Manager named John and then, from Workgroup Owner named Sam, followed by an individual approval from Fredrick himself.

Now to achieve this, following are the defined conditions for the approval workflow.

Figure: Conditions

After the resolved incident met the above configured conditions, the approval process (post resolution incident) will start. It will notify first to the reporting manager of the assigned Analyst of the ticket. After the Reporting Manager's approval,  it will notify to the Owner of the assigned workgroup of the ticket. And the final approval and mandatory approval is from Fredrick. After the final approval, the incident status is changed based on an approval mapping.

Figure: Approval Levels

To configure this approval, Fredrick specifies the Approval Level count as 3, in the APPROVAL CONFIGURATION page and specifies the other mandatory details like Approver Workflow Name, Description and so on. ACTION panel configuration is as follows:

The following diagram depicts the above approval level scenario:


To Configure the Approval

The following section provides details of how to configure approval workflow.

To configure the approver workflow, perform the following steps:

  1. Select Incident > Configuration > Others > Approval Configuration. The APPROVAL CONFIGURATION page appears.
  2. Select the required Tenant, click ADD NEW under the ACTIONS panel, and fill in all the details on the APPROVAL CONFIGURATION page to configure approval conditions and approval levels. For more information about the fields on the APPROVAL CONFIGURATION page, see Field Description.
  3. Click SUBMIT. A new Approval workflow is added.

Figure: Approval Configuration page

Field Description

The following table describes the fields on the APPROVAL CONFIGURATION details page:

Field

Description

GENERAL DETAILS

Approval Workflow Name

Specify the approval workflow name.

Description

Specify the description about the approval workflow.

Active

Indicates the status of the approval workflow.

  • If selected, the approval workflow is enabled for the selected Tenant.
  • If not selected, the approval workflow becomes an inactive value.
CONDITION

Field

The fields related to incident management module are populated in the drop-down list. Select the required option.

Standard Attributes

  • Analyst /Assigned To
  • Category
  • Classification
  • Impact
  • Major Incident
  • Medium
  • Priority
  • Resolution code
  • Resolution SLA Violation
  • Response SLA Violation
  • Service Window
  • Urgency
  • Workgroup/Assigned Workgroup

User Attributes

  • Caller Location
  • Customer
  • Location
  • User Type
  • Username/Caller

Operator

Based on the selected field value, the operators are displayed. Select the required operator from the drop-down list. The Possible values for Operator are:

  • Equal To (=)
  • Not Equal To (! =)
  • IN and NOT IN
  • Greater than Equal To (>=)
  • Less than Equal To (<=)
  • Greater than (>)
  • Less than (<)
  • Between
  • Contains
ValuesBased on the selected Field type and Operator the options are populated in the Values field.

Click the  icon to add a new condition.

Click the icon to delete the selected condition.

ACTION
Approval Level

Select the approval level from the drop-down list. Select the required option from minimum 1 to maximum 10.

Based on the selected number, the following grid section will display the number of rows to fill the details of approvals. 

For Example: If you select the Approval Level as 4. The following grid section will display the 4 rows. A sample screenshot is shown below:

Figure: Approval Level

Level NoDisplays the level number for which the approval is being configured.
Approval Type

Select the approval type from the drop-down list. Available options are as follows:

  • Select Individual - If the Approval Type is selected as Select Individual, then select or specify the specific approver name in Approver Name text search box.  These individual approvers will get an e-mail notification for the pending approval.

  • Workgroup Owner - If the Approval Type is selected as Workgroup Owner, and once the incident qualifies the workflow then it will notify to the Owner of the assigned workgroup of the ticket.

  • Custom Approver Group - If the Approval Type is selected as Custom Approver Group, then select the approver group from the drop-down list. The list displays all of the groups configured in Approval Configuration done on User Group configuration page.

  • Reporting Manager - If the Approval Type is selected as Reporting Manager, and once the incident qualifies the workflow then it will notify to the reporting manager of the assigned Analyst of the ticket.
Approver Name

Specify the individual approver name or the approver group name based on the Approval Type.

If the Approval Type is selected is Custom Approver Group, then a gear icon is displayed next to the approver name. 

Note:

Gear icon is displayed only if Approval Type is selected as Custom Approver Group.

Click on the icon. The following popup is displayed:

Figure: Gear Icon Popup

Field Description

Field Description
Required Approver Count

Select the required approver count from the drop-down list. 

For Example: Select 2 as Required Approver Count if there should be 2 approvers from the selected group.

Or

Select ALL as Required Approver Count if all should be the approvers from the selected group.

Approver NameDisplays the names of the approvers associated with the selected group.
Is MandatorySelect Is Mandatory check box to indicate the associated approver is mandatory approver.

Email notification will be sent to all of the above selected approvers mentioning the required count of approval along with mandatory approvals.

For example: If Required Approver Count is selected as 3 with approver names selected as Fredrick, John and Sam, and Is Mandatory checkbox is selected for Fredrick, then the email notification will be sent to the entire group mentioning about the required 3 (Fredrick, John and Sam) including mandatory Approval from Fredrick. 

If one non-mandatory approval either done from John or Sam then the email will be sent to group mentioning that 1 approval is done and 2 approvals are left including the mandatory approval from Fredrick.

If you select the mandatory approvers more than number of the approvers specified in Required Approver Count then system displays the following error message:

Figure: Error Message

Update IM Status To

Select the required option from the drop-down list. The sub-status of the incident is changed to the selected status after the Approval, while the actual status of the incident will remain as "Pending for Approval". Available options are based on the status configuration done in Status Configuration page.

  • The prerequisite status to begin the approval flow is status Awaiting Approval, hence based on the condition set if the approval is enabled, then the Update IM Status gets updated to Awaiting Approval status and the first level of approval is initiated.
  • Once the approval is done against a given level, the status should be updated to the status value configured under Update IM status To against that level.

Approval Configuration - LIST page

You can view the all approvals workflow list page with the Group Name, Approved By, Created Date columns.  A sample screenshot is shown below:

Figure: USER GROUP - LIST Page

Field Description

The following table describes the fields on the Approval Configuration LIST page:

Field

Description

LIST

Workflow ID

Displays the workflow ID.

Workflow Name

Displays the name of the workflow.

Workflow Description

Displays the description of the workflow.

Approval Levels

Displays the approval levels.

Created By

Displays the name who has created the workflow.

Created On

Displays the date on which the workflow was created.