Incident Approval Process

1. Overview

An approval process is introduced to the incident action creation process, where it can be sent for sequential/concurrent approval by authorised users, before being formally established as an action.

2. Enable Approval Object Configuration

  • In the standard ‘Action Object’ accessed via Menu > Framework > Incident Settings > Object Configurations, an object configuration titled ‘Enable Approval’ will be available where you can enable the action approval process to govern your incident action creation process to go through approvers, before it displays as open actions.

Figure 2.1

3. Standard Permissions Configuration

  • There are two new standard permissions introduced to the standard permission area accessed via Menu > Framework > Incident Settings > User Roles > [Standard Permissions] as below with the stated functionalities.

    • Standard Incident Approver Permission – This will give a user the permission to approve an incident action created and submitted by a submitter user.

    • Standard Incident Action Draft Submission Permission – This will give a user the permission to create an incident action and submit for the approval by an approver. This user role should be tied in with an appropriate user role providing add permission for the action object following the current standard system behaviour.

Figure 3.1

4. Approval Submission in Incident Workflow

  • Once the approvals are enabled for the object, an approval submission section as below will appear in the workflow for the users with the ‘Standard Incident Action Draft Submission Permission’.

Note: See section 'Trigger Criteria' under article Incident Settings – Notification Templates & Notifications for details on setting up notifications for the Incident Approval process.

Submitter users will be able to enter the below details and submit an action for approvals.

  • Approval Process Type: Will list two options for approval process types with the stated functionality.

    • Sequential – The approval process goes from approver to approver in a sequential manner in the order they are selected from the dropdown ‘Approval authority’. All approvers in that order will need to approve the action for it to be considered approved. This sequential approval process type will be the default type selected when initiating the approval process.

    • Concurrent – The approval process goes to all approvers simultaneously. Any approver from the selected list from the ‘Approval Authority’ field can approve the action and it will be considered approved. 

  • Approval Authority: A multi-select staff dropdown listing all staff with a user role with ‘Standard Incident Approver Permission’ assigned. Staff picked from here will receive records submitted for their approval in their 'My Quick Update' area under the 'My Approvals' section, where they can either choose to approve/reject the records. Additionally, they can navigate to the details view by clicking on the hyperlink to approve/reject from the details page as well.

  • Approval Status: Shows the current approval status the record is at. The statuses are;

    • Draft – This means the record is still the draft state (saved as draft) and had not been submitted for approvals yet.

    • Submitted – This means the record is submitted for approvals and now pending to be approved.

    • Rejected – This means the record was rejected/not approved by an approver.

    • Resubmitted – This means the record which once was rejected was corrected and resubmitted for approvals.

    • Approved – This means the record is approved. Only the actions which are approved will be displayed in the action register, dashboards and reports.

  • Drafter (Submitted for approval by): Maintains a record of the incident action draft submitter. 

  • Submission Date: Maintains a record of when the record was submitted for approvals. 

  • Submit for Approval: You can submit your actions for approvals via this button. 

  • The History Grid: A table showing the history of approvals for the record from data/time, username, status and any approve/reject commentary added.

Note: The incident creator user will have the ability to send the request for approval for the incidents which exists in the organisation. The incident record will be made ‘Open’ only if they have been approved through the formal approver. Till records are approved, these will be placed in the a ‘Draft’ status and will not appear in reports and analysis areas.