Assembling/Editing an Approver Task List

Note: This feature requires the Material Request & Approval module licensed at your site.

Like requester tasks, approver tasks are performed in order to gather and record information about a requested material. But while requester tasks are performed by the requester, approver tasks are performed by approvers: users selected to assess material requests. A request's approver task list is a list of tasks chosen to complete the information provided by the requester; that is, to gather and record sufficient information about the requested material to decide whether to approve or reject the request.

When a material request is submitted, its approver task list automatically becomes the approver template (pre-defined list of approver tasks; for details, see Administration: MRAP Task Templates) selected for the request type. The users responsible for the first available tasks in the list receive automatic emails informing them of the tasks ready to be performed; thus the approval task list is automatically determined, and the performance of these tasks can begin immediately (see Performing Approver Tasks).

However, in more complex or irregular situations, you can use the procedure below to:

● Assemble an approver task list when a request's type has no selected approver template. This means the request, once submitted, has no default approver task list, and this list must be built before its approver tasks can be performed.

● Edit an approver task list when the current list needs altering for any reason. This can be done before or after any of the tasks have been started.

Whenever assembling or editing an approver task list, remember the following:

● The tasks in an approver task list can be arranged in any order, with two exceptions:

● The last task in any approver task list must be an Approve/Reject Request task or a Final Approval/Rejection task. The performance of this task entails entering the final decision to approve or reject the request. For details on these task types, see MRAP Task Types.

● An IHS Hold task should be placed only after an SDS Abbreviated task. For details on these task types, see MRAP Task Types.

● If you remove an approver task that is already started or completed, any data entered for that task is lost.

● Any approver task in the list can be assigned one or more responsible users and/or user groups. These assigned users will receive automatic email notification when this task is available to be performed, and only they and your site's MRAP administrators (see Site Settings) have permission to perform this task.

● When adding tasks to an approver task list, you can add individual tasks or whole approver templates (see Administration: MRAP Task Templates).

● Any approver task in the list can be designated a "key" task. Any "key" task must be completed before any following tasks can be performed.

● Approve/Reject Request tasks can be placed at any position in the list. When approvers reach one of these tasks, they can use it to reject the request immediately, when appropriate. If some tasks in a task list are higher-priority—that is, they might yield "deal-breaker" information that merits immediate rejection of the request—consider the following list arrangement:

1. High-priority tasks

2. Approve/Reject Request task, set as a "key" task: This allows approvers to assess the results of the high-priority tasks before further tasks are performed. After assessing these results, the approvers can reject the request immediately or allow the process to continue.

3. Medium-priority tasks

4. Approve/Reject Request task, set as a "key" task.

5. Low-priority tasks

6. Final Approval/Rejection task

To assemble or edit an approval task list:

Starting at the Material Request & Approval page (How do I get there?), do the following:

1. Open a request's Approver Tasks display by doing any of the following:

● If you have an automatic email containing a link to this request, click the link. (When a submitted request has no default approver task list, your site's MRAP administrators receive an automatic email informing them of this situation.) If this opens a Request Summary display, click Tasks in the upper right to open the Approver Tasks display.

● Use the MRAP search tool (see Searching Requests and Tasks for details) to search for it. When it appears in your search results,click its request number to open it. If this opens a Request Summary display, click Tasks in the upper right to open the Approver Tasks display.

The Approver Tasks display opens, showing the request's current approver task list (which may be empty).

2. Click the Edit button in the lower right-hand corner of the display.

3. To add a whole approval template (i.e., a pre-defined list of approver tasks; see Administration: MRAP Task Templates for details) to the approver task list, click the Add Templates button in the lower left-hand corner. In the Available Templates pick list, choose the template you wish to add and click the Add button.

4. To add individual tasks to the list, click the Add Tasks button. In the Available Tasks pick list, choose the task you wish to add and click the Add button. Repeat to add multiple tasks. When you’re done adding tasks, click the Close button.

5. To remove any unwanted tasks from the list, click their remove () icons.

6. Arrange the tasks into the order in which they should be performed. To move a task to a different spot in the list, click its move () icon, move the mouse pointer to the spot where you want to move the task, and click. Repeat until the tasks are listed in the desired order. (Remember: The last task in the list must be a task of the Approve/Reject Request type or Final Approval/Rejection type.)

7. Now that the list contains only the desired tasks in the desired order, click the Save button in the lower right-hand corner. The names of the tasks in your list will become links.

8. Click the name of the first task in your list.

9. To require that this task be completed before any succeeding tasks are performed, click the appropriate checkbox. (This setting will be shown by a key () icon when you next view the task list.)

10. To assign a certain user group as responsible for performing this task, find the desired user group in the Responsible User Groups section’s left-hand list, select it, and click the adjacent Add >> button. (You may select multiple groups by Ctrl-clicking or clicking-and-dragging.) To assign one or more specific users to be responsible for this task, perform the same procedure in the Responsible Users section. (Note: If you do not assign any responsible parties to a task, any user with the required permissions can perform it.)

11. Click the Save button. Click the next task in the list that you want to be completed before any succeeding tasks, or to which you want to assign responsible users, and repeat steps 8-10.

12. To have instructions appear over your list of approver tasks (or to edit any instructions that are already defined), click the Instructions button at the bottom of the display, enter the desired instructions in the Approver Instructions field that appears, and click Save.

13. Now that the list of approver tasks is fully defined, click the Done button. If the request’s Status (shown in the upper right-hand corner) is one of the Open group, your approver task list is ready to be performed. If the request’s status is shown as [None], however, then the request must be “opened” (i.e., have its status changed to the Open group) before its approver tasks can be performed. In this case, open the request by choosing an Open status in the Material Request Status pick list in the lower left-hand corner and then clicking Open Request.