Working With An Approval Process

While you are in the process of creating an approval process, you do not want your users to see it in the application. While it is under construction, the only person who can see it in the application is you, the System administrator.

When you initially create an approval process, you also implicitly create its final approval step — the step that requires final approval after all subordinate approvals. The top level of an approval process must consist of only one step. You cannot create an approval process with multiple steps at the top level.

• To create an approval step with a Simple final step, see Creating an approval process with a Simple final step.
• To create an approval step with a Hierarchical final step, see Creating an approval process with a Hierarchical final step.

Creating an approval process with a Simple final step

A Simple approval step represents one area of data in the approval process whose status is determined by its Owner and Approver.

To create an approval process with a Simple final step, follow these steps.

1. If you have not yet designed a plan for your approval process, as described in Planning an approval process, it is a good idea to do so now.
2. Choose File > New > Approval Process Using Wizard. The Start dialog of the wizard appears.

   Note: There are two ways to create an approval process — by completing individual dialogs, or by using the wizard. (The other alternative is to click the Blank Approval Process icon or choose File > New > Blank Approval Process.) This documentation demonstrates the wizard method only.

   

3. Click Next. The Process Properties dialog of the wizard appears.

   

4. Complete these fields:
1. Process name: Type a name for the approval process. Each process name must be unique. You cannot include a hard return in the name, or any of the following characters:
   • ‘
   • “
   • /
   • \
2. Dimension: When you create a process, this is automatically and always set to TIMEPER.
5. For Enforce chain of command, do one of the following:
   • In a hierarchical step, Approvers can normally approve only the approval area immediately below their own, and only when all lower approval steps have been approved. If this is the scenario you prefer, leave this field selected.
   • If you want to allow Approvers in a hierarchical step to be permitted to approve all levels of their approval area (or subarea lower in the tree) regardless of current status, clear this field. The person approving multiple levels needs write-access to symbols from the top level they are approving from down to the last level.
6. For Certify data, do one of the following:
   • If you want to provide the option to certify data as a part of your approval process, select this field.
   • If you do not want to provide the option to certify data, leave this field cleared.

   Note: The Certify data field displays if the System attribute SWFUseCertification is set to TRUE only in Longview Application Administrator. For more information, see the Longview Application Administrator Guide.

7. For the Available Symbols list, select the Time Period symbols for this process, and click the arrow keys to move them to the Selected Symbols list. When you select time period symbols, you must select all levels.
8. You can search for symbols in several ways:
1. Through the hierarchy: Click on symbol names in the hierarchy to drill down to the appropriate symbol. Parent symbols that you can expand, and collapse are identified by a grey circle beside them.
2. By name: Start to type its name in the Search field. (You do not have to worry about case-sensitivity.) The application finds the first symbol whose name contains the letters you typed. To find the next occurrence, click Find Next.
3. By description: Select By Description and start to type its description in the Search field. (You do not have to worry about case-sensitivity.) The application finds the first symbol whose description contains the letters you typed. To find the next occurrence, click Find Next.
9. When you are finished, click Next. The Approval Step Type dialog of the wizard appears.

   

10. Select Simple Approval Step and click Next. The Information dialog of the wizard appears.

    

11. Complete these fields:
    1. Description: Type a name for the approval step. Each step name must be unique.
    2. Status: When you create a step, Status is automatically set to Not Started. However, when you edit an existing process, you can use this field to change status.
    3. Visible: Visible displays if the System attribute SWFUseVisibility is set to TRUE only in Longview Application Administrator. For more information, see the Longview Application Administrator Guide. Data in an approval process can be visible or invisible. For more information, see Changing data visibility.
       • If you want users to be able to change the visibility of data, select this field.
       • If you do not want users to be able to change the visibility of data, leave this field cleared.
12. If you have a bilingual system, you may want to add alternate language descriptions for a step. To add alternate language descriptions, click the Add Alternate Descriptions icon.
13. If you want, you can associate a Longview Analysis and Reporting report template (.rtp) to each step to facilitate the viewing of approval data from the web. You can associate only one report template to a Data Area.
    1. If you do not want to associate a report template to this process, proceed to step 14.
    2. For the Available Templates list, select a report template, and click the arrow keys to move it to the Selected Template list.
14. Click Next. The Owners dialog of the wizard appears.

    

15. From the Available Users list, select user IDs for this Data Area, and click the arrow keys to move them to the Selected Owners list.
16. When you are finished, click Next. The Approvers dialog of the wizard appears.

    

17. From the Available Users list, select user IDs for this Data Area, and click the arrow keys to move them to the Selected Approvers list.
18. When you are finished, click Next. The Fixed Dimensions dialog of the wizard appears.

    

19. For each dimension other than TIMEPER, you must select symbols.
    1. From the Available Symbols list, select symbols for this Data Area, and click the arrow keys to move them to the Selected Symbols list. Do not forget to select symbols for all dimensions. In many cases, you may want to select the Dim#Set symbol.
    2. Select the number of levels in the hierarchy for each symbol.
    3. To select all symbols immediately under the selected symbols, excluding the highlighted symbol, click the All symbols immediately under selected symbols icon.
    4. To select all leaf symbols immediately under the selected symbols, click the All leaves under selected symbols icon.
20. When you are finished, click Next. The Finish dialog of the wizard appears.

    

21. In this dialog, review your selections. To make changes, click Back.
22. Click Finish. Your new process appears in the Longview Workflow Designer, containing the final step.

    

23. To add other steps to this approval process, see Adding an approval step.

Creating an approval process with a Hierarchical final step

A Hierarchical approval step represents multiple Data Areas defined by a hierarchy in a dimension (often ENTITIES).

To create an approval process with a Hierarchical final step, follow these steps.

Note: There are two ways to create an approval process — by completing individual dialogs, or by using the wizard. This section demonstrates the wizard method only.

1. If you have not yet designed a plan for your approval process, as described in Planning an approval process, it is a good idea to do so now.
2. Choose File > New > Approval Process Using Wizard. The Start dialog of the wizard appears.

   

3. Click Next. The Process Properties dialog of the wizard appears.

   

4. Complete these fields:
   3. Process name: Type a name for the approval process. Each process name must be unique. You cannot include a hard return in the name, or any of the following characters:
      • ‘
      • “
      • /
      • \
6. Dimension: When you create a process, this is automatically and always set to TIMEPER.

Specifying options for an approval process

In addition to the details that you specify when you create an approval process, you can specify several other options as well.

To specify options for an approval process, follow these steps.

1. Choose File > Open Process. The Open Existing Approval Process dialog appears.

   

2. Select the approval process and click OK.
3. Choose Tools > Options. The Options dialog appears.

   

4. If you want to associate a Longview Analysis and Reporting report template (rtp) to each step, as described in “Associated report templates” on page 37, and you want to be notified if a template is missing for a step, select Display missing template warning message.
5. For Display, for symbols in the various dimensions of your database, specify whether you want the approval process to display their symbol name, symbol description, or both.
6. When you are finished, click OK.

Activating an approval process

When you create an approval process, the only person who can see it in the application is you, the System administrator. When it is ready for use, the Longview Workflow software makes it visible to the appropriate users by inserting an alert on their web page, if you have included the appropriate web token on the users’ web page. To do so, you need to activate it.

To activate an approval process, follow these steps.

1. Choose File > Open Process. The Open Existing Approval Process dialog appears.

   

2. Select the approval process and click OK.
3. Choose Tools > Validate Process. The validation functionality checks for symbol overlaps and other possible problems, such as those that may have been caused by incorrect symbol maintenance.
   • If error messages appear, go back to correct the approval process.
   • If a warning regarding a missing report template appears, go back to associate a report template to this process, if you want.

   Note: Validation also occurs automatically if you close, and then reopen, an approval process.

Editing an approval process

If any of the details of an approval process are incorrect, you can correct them.

Caution: When you edit an activated approval process, you may inadvertently adjust the process flow in a way that you did not intend. Deactivate the process, test, and then activate again. It is your responsibility to ensure the flow is still valid, or to inform Owners of impacted steps of the actions they need to take to make corrections.

To edit an approval process, follow these steps.

1. Choose File > Open Process. The Open Existing Approval Process dialog appears.

   

2. Select the approval process and click OK.
3. To edit the process properties, follow these steps.
   1. Choose Tools > Process Properties.
   2. Make changes as necessary.
4. To edit a step in the process:
   1. Right-click on the step box. A pop-up menu appears.
   2. Choose Properties. The Approval Step Properties dialog appears

      

   3. Click the appropriate tabs and make changes as necessary.
5. Click OK.

Copying an approval process

When you have an established approval process that meets your needs, you can copy it for use elsewhere. For example, you may want to copy a month-end expense approval process from one month to the next.

To copy an approval process, follow these steps.

1. Choose File > Open Process. The Open Existing Approval Process dialog appears.

   

2. Select the approval process and click OK.
3. Click the Copy Process icon. The Start dialog of the wizard appears

   

4. Click Next. The Select a Process dialog of the wizard appears.

   

5. Select the process you want to copy and click Next. The Process Properties dialog of the wizard appears.

   

6. Complete these fields:
   3. Process name: Type a name for the approval process. Each process name must be unique. You cannot include a hard return in the name, or any of the following characters:
      • ‘
      • “
      • /
      • \
8. Dimension: When you create a process, this is automatically and always set to TIMEPER.

Adding a certification definition to an approval process

If you select the Certify data field in step 6 of Creating a Simple Process, or step 6 of Creating a Hierarchical Process, the Define Certification Definition menu item is active (otherwise, it is unavailable). This dialog is used to customize the certification message that users receive when they certify data in an approval process on the web. For more information, see Certifying data in an approval process.

Note: The certification definition can be set only for active processes.

To add a certification definition to an approval process, follow these steps.

1. Choose File > Open Process. The Open Existing Approval Process dialog appears.

   

2. Select the approval process and click OK.
3. Choose Tools > Define Certification Definition. The Certification Definition dialog appears.

   

4. Complete these fields:
   1. Language: Select the two-letter language code that you want to use from the drop-down list.
   2. Agree Comment: Enter a comment that displays after the user agrees with the certification statement.
   3. Disagree Comment: Enter a comment that displays after the user disagrees with the certification statement
5. Enter your desired certification message in the main field. This message displays as the Certification Statement in Workflow on the web. For more information, see Certifying data in an approval process.
6. Click OK.

Deactivating an approval process

If an approval process is activated, users can use it to change the status of their Data Areas. However, if you need to make changes to the process, you may want to suspend that activity. To do so, you need to deactivate the process.

To deactivate an approval process, follow these steps.

1. Choose File > Open Process. The Open Existing Approval Process dialog appears.

   

2. Select the approval process and click OK.
3. Choose Tools > Deactivate. A confirmation dialog appears.

Deleting an approval process

If you no longer need an approval process, you can delete it.

Caution: If you follow this procedure, you cannot reverse your decision. Use with caution.

To delete an approval process, follow these steps.

1. Choose File > Open Process. The Open Existing Approval Process dialog appears.

   

2. Select the approval process and click OK.
3. Click the Delete Process icon. A confirmation message appears.
4. Click Yes. The process is deleted.