SharePoint WorkSpace: Approval WorkFlow in SharePoint 2013

SharePoint Help: Now that you have an amazing intranet on SharePoint 2013 you don’t want everyone putting things in your document libraries unless you approve it first. The best way to keep good content on your intranet and bad content out is by attaching an approval workflow to the library. This blog post will give you step by step instructions on how to customize SharePoint and attach an approval workflow to a document library.

The workflows included with SharePoint products are features that you can use to automate your business processes, making them both more consistent and more efficient. You can use a SharePoint Approval workflow to route documents and other items stored in SharePoint products to one or more people for their approval. And with a SharePoint workflow handling your process for you, you’ve got more time for all the other things you need to get done.

By default, the Approval workflow is not activated and is not listed in the Select a workflow templatelist box of the association form. To make it available for use, a site administrator must activate them at the site collection level.

SharePoint workflows are:

· Efficient and consistent An Approval workflow automatically routes the document or item, assigns review tasks and tracks their progress, and sends reminders and notifications when needed. The activity in a workflow can be monitored and adjusted from a central status page, and the history of events in a workflow run is maintained for 60 days after completion.

· Less work for you An Approval workflow saves you and your colleagues both time and trouble, and at the same time streamlines and standardizes your approval process.

Here’s a diagram of a very simple version of the Approval workflow.

1. What can an Approval workflow do for me?

· When you first add an Approval workflow to your list, library, or site collection, you can specify how many participants to include, and indicate whether their tasks are assigned one after another (in serial) or all at once (in parallel). You can even decide whether to divide the participants’ tasks into two or more separate stages, as well specify a final due date and/or the time allowed for each task to be completed. And each time that you start the workflow manually on an item, you can modify any of these settings.

· The workflow assigns a task to each specified participant. Each participant chooses among several possible responses: to approve or reject the item, to request a change in the item, to reassign the task, or to cancel or delete the task.

· While the workflow is running, you can monitor progress and make adjustments (if needed) from a single, central Workflow Status page.

· For 60 days after the workflow is completed, the list of all workflow events that occurred in the course of this run (or instance) of the workflow is still available on the Workflow Status page, for informal reference.

2. What can’t an Approval workflow do?

· Participants in an Approval workflow aren’t usually permitted to make changes in the item being reviewed. Instead, participants can request that changes be made to the item in the course of the workflow instance. If you want to add a workflow in which participants insert comments and tracked changes in the item itself, see the article, All about Collect Feedback workflows, in the See Also section.

· Also, Approval workflows aren’t designed to collect signatures. If you want to use a workflow to collect signatures in a Microsoft Word document, a Microsoft Excel workbook, or a Microsoft InfoPath form, see the article,All about Collect Signatures workflows, in the See Also section.

3. Who can use this type of workflow?

· To add a workflow By default, you must have the Manage Lists permission to add a workflow. (The Owners group has the Manage Lists permission by default; the Members group and the Visitors group do not.)

· To start a workflow Also by default, you must have the Edit Items permission to start a workflow that’s already been added. (The Members group and the Owners group both have the Edit Items permission by default; the Visitors group does not.)

· Alternatively, Owners can choose to configure specific workflows so that they can be started only by members of the Owners group. (To do this, select the Require Manage Lists Permissions to start this workflow check box, on the first page of the association form.)

4. How do you plan, add, run, and maintain this type of workflow?

These are the basic stages:

· BEFORE the workflow runs (plan, add, start)
Before you add a workflow, you plan where you want to add it (for a single list or library, or for the entire site collection) and the details of how it will work. After you’ve added and configured the workflow, anyone with the necessary permissions can start the workflow on a specific item. The workflow can also be set up to runautomatically. Automatic runs can be activated based on either or both of two triggering events: when any item is added to or created in a list or library, or when any item in a list or library is changed.

· WHILE the workflow runs (complete, monitor, adjust)
While the workflow runs, individual participants complete their assigned tasks. Automatic reminders are sent to participants who fail to meet task deadlines. Meanwhile, the progress of the workflow can be monitored from a central Workflow Status page for that particular instance of the workflow. Adjustments to the workflow while it runs can be made from that same page; and, if necessary, the workflow can be canceled or terminated from there.

· AFTER the workflow runs (review, report, change)
When the workflow is complete, the whole history of that run (or instance) can be reviewed for up to 60 days on the Workflow Status page. From the same page, statistical reports on the performance of this workflow version can be created. Finally, if there is ever anything that you want to change about the way the workflow functions, you can open and edit the association form that you completed when you first added the workflow.

The following flow chart illustrates these stages from the perspective of the person who is adding a new workflow.

Step by Step Instructions on How to Create a SharePoint 2013 Approval Workflow

Step 1: Navigate to the document library where you would like to attach the workflow to; an example of this is by clicking the Documents title on your Home Page shown below:

You will know when you are in the document library when the five titled boxes disappear, shown below:

Step 2: Click the LIBRARY tab in the top left corner shown below, the ribbon will appear, click Workflow Settings, and then click Add a Workflow:

Step 3: Make sure the drop down is This List is selected in the dropdown. Click Add a workflow.

Step 4:

· Select Approval as the workflow type from the drop down

· Type a unique name for this workflow: Approval

· Make the drop Down: New task list

· Select a history list: Workflow history (new)

· Make sure this is checked: Allow this workflow to be manually started by an authenticated user with Edit Item permissions.

· Make sure this is checked: Start this workflow when a new item is created.

· Make sure this is checked: Start this workflow when an item is changed.

· Click Next

The next prompt that will appear is the “Change a Workflow” prompt which will allow you to assign the task to an individual, e-mail them a message, assign a due date, give a duration for the task, carbon copy someone, and give approval or rejection specifics. Depending on your specifics of the workflow you may want to configure your settings and message a little different than I have mine. Either way everyone’s SharePoint Implementation is different.

The prompt looks like the following:

Step 5:

· Assign Approver

· Write approver a message that will appear in the e-mail sent to them by SharePoint

· Make sure “end on first rejection” is selected

· Click “Save”

Some useful things:

The new workflow will be added to the workflow list shown below:

When you see the above, the workflow has been attached to the library already. Once someone adds a document the person you specified above to receive the notification will get the following e-mail from SharePoint with the message you configured.

The receiver of the message should click the title of the file that was uploaded to review it; this is in blue and underlined. If they approve they should click the following button in Outlook shown below called Open this Task.