Grouped Approval Requests provide a way to streamline notifications when multiple requests are made at the same time, as well as allowing Reviewers to respond to multiple requests at once, saving time and effort.
Grouped Requests are supported for the below Workflow Types: (click to jump to the relevant section)
This article will take you through the below: (click to jump to the relevant section)
- Grouped Resource Download Requests
- Grouped Resource Publish Requests
- Grouped Record File Approval Requests
- Reviewing Grouped Requests
Grouped Download Requests
The Grouped Download Approval Request feature allows users with ‘Preview’ permission to request download approvals for multiple Resources from Folders with Workflows. It also allows Reviewers to respond to such multiple requests at once, saving time and effort for large download requests.
Users needing multiple images for projects have the ability to request files in the same form submission instead of requesting each one separately.
This feature can also be accessed from both a users Collection(s) and Search Results within the platform.
Multi-Step Request & Download Process
When a Grouped Download Approval request is submitted the platform automatically builds a multi-step process in order to:
- Request approval across different approval workflows a user belongs to (See Step 1 below)
- Give a user the ability to download any selected resources that may have been pre-approved or auto-completed resources as part of this request, all in the same process (Step 2)
Step 1: Download Request for Selected Resources
Step 2: Bulk Download Approved Items
Workflow Set-Up to enable Grouped Downloads
Note that Grouped Download Approval Requests are only supported for:
- Global Download Resource Workflows that have the ‘Allow Location Customization’ setting disabled. The workflow cannot be customized on a folder by folder basis. (For more about the Location Customization setting, click here.)
Grouped Download request is currently enabled by default for any Download Request Workflow, and cannot be disabled. It will apply on whatever folder(s) the Download Workflow has been configured against.
Grouped Resource Publish Requests
The Grouped Resource Publish Request feature allows items that are Uploaded or Edited together via a Publish Approval process to be grouped together, which they can monitor collectively or still as individual requests. It also allows Reviewers to respond to such multiple requests within a group all at once.
It will apply to either items that are being added/edited from the same folder, or in some cross-folders bulk editing scenarios.
Workflow Set-Up to Enable Grouped Resource Publish Requests
In the Workflow Template for a new or existing Resource Publish Workflow, ensure the 'Enable Grouped Requests' setting is checked and the Template is then saved with this enabled.
This will now apply on whatever folder(s) the Publish Workflow has been configured against.
Note that only requests made after, and when, this setting is enabled will be Grouped following the logic outlined below. (This will not apply retrospectively to earlier requests, and likewise if disabled again will no longer be supported for future requests while disabled.)
In the User Notifications there will be new options when this setting is enabled:
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For the Requester:
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Grouped Request submission confirmation
- One email will be sent to confirm the items that have been requested and form this group request.
-
Grouped Request has been completed
- Requester will receive an alert when all items in the group are completed. If 'Also send individual completed emails' is also enabled, the requester will receive both individual alerts as items are completed one-by-one, as well as the eventual completed one.
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Grouped Request submission confirmation
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For the Reviewer(s):
-
Grouped Request notification
- One email will be sent to confirm the items that are required to review
- Note this is only applicable for reviewers on the first stage of a staged workflow. Reviewers on subsequent stages will receive individual alerts as they are required to review items, (if other settings are configured for them to receive these alerts).
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Grouped Request notification
Definition of what makes a Resource Publish 'Group'
For Grouped Resource Publish Requests, a Group is defined by either Bulk Upload, or Bulk Edit scenarios when multiple items are submitted for approval at the same time. This may then be when:
- For Bulk Upload - If a user is submitting in batches within the same upload session, then each batch may become its own Group.
- For Bulk Edit - for Cross Folder handling, items will be Grouped by each Workflow Template that is involved - so there may be multiple Grouped Requests created from the single bulk submit in this scenario.
- For either Bulk Upload or Bulk Edit, If any items fail submit validation, they will be excluded from the Group (since they need to be submitted again.)
- If only a single item is sent for approval on either Bulk Upload or Bulk Edit pages, they will be excluded from the group logic
Grouped Record File Approval Requests
The Grouped Record File Approval Request feature allows items in a Multi Upload field in a record to be grouped together when they are requested for Approval in Bulk. Requesters can then monitor their requests either collectively as a group, or still as individual requests. It also allows Reviewers to respond to multiple requests within a group all at once.
Workflow Set-Up to Enable Grouped Record File Approval Requests
In the Workflow Template for a new or existing Record File Approval Workflow, ensure the 'Enable Grouped Requests' setting is checked and the Template is then saved with this enabled.
This will now apply on whatever Multi Upload Fields the Record File Approval Workflow has been configured against in your Databases.
Note that only requests made after, and when, this setting is enabled will be Grouped following the logic outlined below. (This will not apply retrospectively to earlier requests, and likewise if disabled again will no longer be supported for future requests while disabled.)
In the User Notifications there will be new options when this setting is enabled:
-
For the Requester:
-
Grouped Request submission confirmation
- One email will be sent to confirm the items that have been requested and form this group request.
-
Grouped Request has been completed
- Requester will receive an alert when all items in the group are completed. If 'Also send individual completed emails' is also enabled, the requester will receive both individual alerts as items are completed one-by-one, as well as the eventual completed one.
-
Grouped Request submission confirmation
-
For the Reviewer(s):
-
Grouped Request notification
- One email will be sent to confirm the items that are required to review
- Note this is only applicable for reviewers on the first stage of a staged workflow. Reviewers on subsequent stages will receive individual alerts as they are required to review items, (if other settings are configured for them to receive these alerts).
-
Grouped Request notification
Definition of what makes a Record File 'Group'
For Grouped Record File Requests the definition of a Group is dictated by what has been selected and then submitted via the Bulk Request action in the multi-upload field.
Reviewing Grouped Requests
Items from any Group Request will also appear as single Requests in the 'Requests' tab of your Approval List, but can also be reviewed in Bulk via the below more streamlined process:
Review Grouped Requests from email notifications
A single consolidated email will be sent to the requestor and approver(s) at the start and to the requestor at the end, once all items have been reviewed.
Click the main link in these emails to be taken to the Group Approval Review Page.
Accessing your Grouped Requests in the Approval Request List
Items can also be approved in Bulk via your Approval Request List.
Click on Grouped Request tab and click on the name for the relevant Grouped Request:
This will open the Grouped Approval Review page and show all items that were requested.
Grouped Approval Review page
The Grouped Approval Review page is split into two main sections; Requests and Responses.
Requests
On the left of this page you can view all the items listed in the request. You can do a number of actions within this space:
- Filter by request status, ie to all Pending or Approved requests
- Search for specific request names
- Select specific requests via checkboxes to apply response information to in bulk or batches
- Open individual requests if you wish to check each in more detail and review them individually
- Perform key actions like Download, Re-assign and Cancel
- View key information about each request (such as remaining Reviewers)
Responses
The right side of the page allows Reviewers to:
- Input Comments
- Add an Approval decision, ie Approved or Declined
- Add an Approved Until date (if applicable)
- Reviewers should Click Apply to Selected to add those details to the selected requests.
Submitting your Response
Once you have added in the needed responses, either in bulk or individually, click Submit & Continue, or Submit & Next (for individual responses). Your Grouped Approval Review page will automatically update to reflect the changes.
You can view a full walkthrough of those options below:
Reporting & Compliance
While Bulk Reviewing via the Group Review page makes things quicker and easier for Reviewers to respond to multiple items, we understand it may not always be your best practice for this to occur. To help monitor how your users are using this feature, tracking is in place to note if users are reviewing one-by-one (either from the Approvals List, or one-by-one from the Bulk Review page) or in Bulk.
This information is available to see in:
- In Workflow History - a Bulk Review column notes which responses were made in single or bulk.
- In Review Request Response section - responses will indicate if they were made in single review, or via bulk review actions:
- In Stats Reporting:
- For Workflow Response reports, 'Bulk Review' column shows how responses were made ('Yes' if in Bulk, 'No' if Single, 'N/A' for unsupported record requests.)
- 'Bulk Review' can also be used as a filtering condition to see matching results that have all been made in Bulk, or not.
- Likewise for Workflow Response reports, a 'Bulk Response UUID' column surfaces a unique ID that can then be used as a condition to see what other requests were made at the same time by the same user.
- For Workflow Response reports, 'Bulk Review' column shows how responses were made ('Yes' if in Bulk, 'No' if Single, 'N/A' for unsupported record requests.)
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* Please note that some of the terms used above such as Workflows & Approvals are customisable and may appear differently in your platform.
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