Prerequisites:
- This article applies to Resolve Admin portal (https://CLIENTNAME.resolve.red/admin/) users with role type 'Report Writer and Approver', who typically review and approve colleagues reports following a predefined workflow.
- An approval workflow needs to be set up in Resolve to define managers or individuals that are part of the process, with flexibility to be configured by Meeting Type, Department, Agenda Item Category and custom Approval templates to suit. To create or change an existing Approval workflow, check with your Governance or Meeting Administrator team.
Tip: For instructions on how to set a colleague as a Back Up Approver, to carry out review and approval on your behalf when you are unavailable or on leave, see article Resolve - Backup Approvers
Go to the required topic by clicking on the relevant section title below.
ITEM REPORT APPROVAL OVERVIEW
NAVIGATING TO ITEM REPORT AWAITING APPROVAL
APPROVAL ACTION OPTIONS
ITEM REPORT APPROVAL OVERVIEW
Where a completed Report requires review and approval prior to being put to a Council or other meeting agenda, Resolve can accommodate your organisation's approval process to formally engage approvers and track progress. The general stages of this in Resolve would be as follows.
- Report Writer (Author) on completing their report content and when ready to seek approval from the first reviewer / approver, will click the INITIATE button locking their report from further changes
- First Approver receives email notification that there is a report approval awaiting their attention
- Approver navigates to related Item Report and reviews and/or updates content on behalf of Author
- Approver selects one of the approval actions, as appropriate; Approve, Deny or Return to Creator and can send the Author comments relating to their response
- Other Approvers involved in the review and approval workflow will be notified in turn as each approver completes their assigned review and approval step
- Completed Report approvals will flag the Item as 100% complete and the Author will be notified
NAVIGATING TO ITEM REPORT AWAITING APPROVAL
There are two ways for Approvers to navigate to Items they are responsible for reviewing and approving, see following sections for steps on these options.
A) Agenda Item Approval Assigned email
Once a Report Writer (Author) has clicked the INITIATE button, an email similar to below, will be sent to the first approver in the set approval workflow
- First, login to the Resolve Admin portal as per normal
- In the received email, click on the Click to View Approvals link (shown above) to navigate to the related Item
- When the Item is displayed in Resolve, you'll see the [Approvals] tab, with the approval routing workflow visible at the bottom of the screen, where it will show that the Item is currently with you for review and approval
- The top-right PREVIEW button will allow you to see the final Report output with any attachments as prepared by the Author
- Click the [Details] and [Other Details] tabs to review content in specific report fields, where it's possible to edit if required, should you want to update on behalf of the Author
B) View all outstanding Approvals on Resolve Home screen
A good option if you want to see all pending Approvals currently with you waiting for action. If you are a Backup Approver for someone else, go to article Resolve - Backup Approvers.
Logged in to the Resolve Admin portal, go to the top menu Home, then select the following options / filters to locate and action approvals:
1. View; ensure 'Me' is selected
2. Timeframe; choose required timeframe, such as 'All Upcoming' (Relates to meeting Event Date the Item Report is associated with, with approval in advance of the meeting).
3. Show; ensure 'Approvals' button is selected to see approvals in search results.
4. Include completed; un-tick this option to avoid seeing historical completed approvals.
5. Update; click button when above criteria complete, to see related search outcome.
6. Results; are shown under the [Approvals] tab, with any Items waiting for approval listed
7. Item Name; click on 'Name' link to navigate into the Item to see full report details, if completing a review or amending content on behalf of the Report Author (Access to view/change the Item Report also depends on your Resolve user profile permissions).
8. Actions; click button corresponding with the Item to be approved, to see 'Approve Agenda Item' pop-up window and the options explained in the last section following.
Tip: If you have navigated into an Item to review the content in detail, you can also complete your approval action under the [Approvals] tab. The APPROVALS ACTION button will be visible here, for the current approver in the workflow.
APPROVAL ACTION OPTIONS
When ready to respond to an approval, either from your Home screen outstanding approvals list or within an Item you are reviewing, clicking on the Actions or Approvals Action button will present the following options.
Approve - Select to confirm approval of Item. If another approver is part of the workflow after you, they'll receive an email notification advising to view and approve. If all approvals completed, the Item progress will appear as 100% under the Agenda Details view.
Deny - Selected to mark the Item as excluded from the related meeting Agenda. This will notify the Author and/or Meeting Administrator that the Item should not be part of the Agenda or that it's to be moved to a future meeting or removed all together as appropriate.
Return to Creator (Resets Approvals) - Return Item to Report Author to revisit and change the content as required. Use SEND MESSAGE button to provide details to the Author or other persons with interest in this Item prior to returning to Creator. Any prior approvals will be reset and the Item available to be edited by the Author again.
Return to Approver - Send Item back to a previous approver in the approval workflow.
Notify Creator That Agenda Item Content Has Changed - Tick to send email to Author to notify if you have made updates to their content.
Add My Signature - Tick to include your signature (if configured in the system), with any email notifications resulting from your review and approval.
Click button to send email message to Report Author (Originator), Approvers, and/or selected Individuals. Use this option prior to saving an Approval, if you need to communicate details on the reasoning for your action.
Click to cancel / close 'Approve Agenda Item' activity window.
Click to save your Approval selections.
If you have approved an Item and further approvers exist in the workflow after you, the next person will receive an email notification to direct them to their newly waiting approval. Once all approvers have completed their review and approval, the Item will record the approval date on the Item [Approvals] tab, as shown below.
Notes:
1. Any notes sent between Approver and Report Author are recorded under the Item [Comments] tab
2. Depending on'Notification' types subscribed to by the Report Author, they may receive email updates during the approval process, for example when Item Approval completed.
Tip: For Meeting Administrators, the current stage of Item approval can been seen for all reports on the Agenda details screen, by checking the Approvals progress bar. Clicking on the progress bar Info link will display the Author and current Approver the Item is sat with for review.
Info - Displays Author and Approver details and progress 