By following the steps below, you can ensure that escalation actions are triggered appropriately, enhancing the efficiency and responsiveness of the approval process. The process includes
Creating escalation policies,
Adding them to the approval steps
While you have the option to create new policies, EmpowerID offers a default escalation policy for your convenience. This default policy includes predefined actions and escalation cutoff days.
To use these policies, you need to create and add them to the approval steps. However, if you plan to use the Notify escalation action type to send email notifications, you will need to make additional configurations. It is important to note that failure to configure these settings will result in the notifications not working.
More information about the default policy and additional configurations can be found in this documentation.
Step 1: Creating Policies
Creating an escalation policy is the first step in managing business requests that haven't been acted upon within a specified timeframe. This policy outlines the actions and timeframes for escalations. Once created, these policies can be applied to multiple approval steps with similar escalation situations. Follow the instructions below to create an escalation policy.
Navigate to Low Code / No Code Workflows and click on the Approval Policies.
Click on the Escalation Policies Tab.
Click on the Create New ➕ icon.
Provide a Name and Display Name for the escalation policy and click on Save.
Search for the recently saved policy and click on the link to open the view one page.
In the View One Page, Find the accordion for Escalation Actions and click on the Add icon.
Provide the necessary values and click on Save.
Escalation after X Days: Number of days after which the escalation action should execute.
Escalation Actions: Actions to be performed as part of the escalation. Escalation actions can include notifications, adding assignees, auto-closing items or steps, etc. Each type of action has specific configurations:
Notify: Select the participant type (e.g., potential approver, potential approver's manager) who will receive the notification.
Add Assignee: Define the type of assignee (person, group, management role) to be added after a specified time.
Auto-Close Item: Define the decision action (approve, revoke, certify, convert to JT) to auto-close the item after a specified time.
Auto-Close Step: Close a specific step in the approval flow, allowing the process to move to the next step.
Name: Name of the escalation step.
Display Name: Provide a user-friendly label or "Display Name."
To add more steps, repeat the same steps.
Click on the Publish button on the display screen. Unpublished policies will not be available for mapping to approval steps.
Step 2: Adding Escalation Policies to Approval Steps
After creating an escalation policy, the next step is to map this policy to specific approval steps within your workflow. This ensures that each approval process step triggers the defined escalation actions appropriately. Follow the instructions below to add escalation policies to approval steps,
Navigate to Low Code / No Code Workflows and click on the No Code Flows.
Select the Approval Steps tab and click on the Add icon to create a new approval step.
Provide the necessary details and click on Save to save the approval step. Please ensure that you select the desired escalation policy from the Escalation Policy dropdown, which we created earlier.
You have successfully created an approval step with a configured escalation policy by following these steps.
Default Escalation Policy
A default escalation policy is applied if no specific policy is configured for an approval step. The default escalation policy includes the following three actions:
Notify Potential Approver: After three (3) days of no action, send a notification to the potential approver.
Notify Potential Approver Again: This action sends another notification if no action is taken within seven(7) days.
Notify the Target Person's Manager: If no action is taken on the business request item after fifteen (15) days, notify the target person's manager.
Additional Configuration for Notify Escalation
You need to ensure the notify escalation action works in these additional configurations. Failing to configure this might result in its failure.
Ensure Notification Policies are Configured
Notification policies for business request escalations are provided with the product; however, you must ensure they are configured correctly:
Navigate to Low Code / No Code Workflow → Notification Policies.
Verify that the notification policies are configured. The policies with the Business Request Event (Global) type should be set to "Renotification."
Ensure notification policies are configured for each participant type. For example, create one to enable notifications if the Commentator participant type lacks a notification policy.
Ensure Notification Preferences are Configured
Create notification preferences for each participant type to ensure users receive email notifications. Note that these preferences are currently created from the database and not through a UI.
Email Templates
Attach the out-of-the-box email template to the notification policies. The template my_tasks_business_request_item_approval_step_approval_notification is currently used for all re-notification policies and includes a general notification message.