Approval Coordinator workflow activity

Release version: Xanadu

Updated August 1, 2024

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Summary of Approval Coordinator workflow activity

The Approval Coordinator activity in ServiceNow workflows enables you to create an approval process whose overall outcome depends on multiple child approval activities, such as Approval - User, Approval - Group, or Manual Approval activities. This activity is only available for workflows running on tables that extend the Task table. It coordinates and consolidates multiple approvals to produce a single result that drives subsequent workflow transitions.

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How it works

To use the Approval Coordinator activity, drag it onto the workflow canvas and configure it using the activity form. You then specify child approval activities linked to it. When the Approval Coordinator completes, all pending child approvals it created are automatically marked as No Longer Required to avoid redundant approvals. If a single user is assigned multiple approval roles within the same workflow, subsequent approvals for that user are skipped after the first one.

Key Input Variables

Wait for: Defines the condition to complete the approval, with options including:
- Any child activity approved
- All child activities approved
- First approval or rejection from any child activity
- Condition based on a custom script
When a rejection occurs: Available if "Wait for" is set to any or all approvals. Specifies whether to reject immediately or wait for other responses before deciding.
Approval script: Used if "Wait for" is set to a script condition. The script evaluates child approvals and sets the overall approval status to approved or rejected, using counts of total, approved, rejected, and pending child activities.

Results and Conditions

The Approval Coordinator activity returns results such as Approved, Rejected, Deleted, or Cancelled, based on the defined approval conditions and child activity outcomes. Workflow transitions depend on these results, triggering subsequent actions.

Activity States

Executing: The activity is actively processing.
Waiting: The activity is paused until a relevant event occurs.
Finished: The activity completed, with a result indicating the approval outcome.
Cancelled: The activity or containing workflow was cancelled.
Error: An error occurred, requiring log review.

Practical Benefits for ServiceNow Customers

Enables complex, multi-level approval coordination within workflows.
Streamlines approval management by automatically resolving redundant or pending approvals.
Provides flexibility through configurable approval conditions and custom scripting.
Improves workflow control by clearly defining approval outcomes and corresponding transitions.

The Approval Coordinator activity creates an approval whose outcome depends on the outcome of one or more child activities, including one or more Approval - User, Approval - Group, and/or Manual Approval activities.

Note:

This activity is only available when the workflow runs on a table that extends Task.

To create an Approval Coordinator activity, first drag the activity onto the workflow canvas, causing the activity form to display. On the activity form, fill in the appropriate fields, then click Submit.

After you click Submit, the activity appears on the workflow canvas. From there, specify the child activities by clicking the links that appear on the body of the activity.

When the Approval Coordinator activity completes, all pending approvals that were created by any of the Approval Coordinator approval activities are immediately set to No Longer Required. If a single user is called as an approver twice by the same workflow, such as when a single user is both a product approver and an executive approver, any approvals for that user after the first are skipped.

Results

The result value of the Approval Coordinator activity depends on the approval actions taken by the approvers and the approval conditions specified in the Wait for field. Possible result values are:

Approved
Rejected
Deleted
Cancelled

Input variables

Input variables determine the initial behavior of the activity.

Table 1. Approval Coordinator activity input variables
Field	Description
Wait for	Indicate what to wait for to indicate that the approval activity is approved or rejected. Options are: Any child activity to be approved: Any child activity (User, Group, or Manual Approval) that completes with a result of approved causes the Approval Coordinator activity to complete with a result of approved. All child activities to be approved: All child activities of the Approval Coordinator activity must complete with a a result of approved to cause the Approval Coordinator activity to complete with a result of approved. The first approval or rejection from any child activity: The first child activity that completes with a result of approved or rejected causes the Approval Coordinator activity to complete with the same result. Condition based on script:Call a script to determine how to manage an approval or rejection.
When a rejection occurs Only appears if Wait for is set to All child activities to be approved or Any child activity to be approved.	Specify what the coordinator should do when it sees a rejection from any one of the child activities. Options are: Reject the approval: Immediately complete the Approval Coordinator activity with a result of rejected. Wait for other responses before deciding: Wait until we get other responses from other child activities before making an approval or rejection decision. This allows users to change their minds until a decision is made. In addition, if Wait for is set to Any child activity to approve then a single child activity completion with a result of approved will cause the Approval Coordinator activity to complete with a result of approved even if other child activities have completed with a result of rejected.
Approval script Only appears if Wait for is set to Condition based on script.	If the Wait for variable is set to Condition based on script this script is called to determine how to handle an approval or rejection. The script needs to set the variable `answer` to , approved or rejected to indicate the overall approval status for this approval. When called, the following variable is available to the script: `counts.total = total number of child approval activities that are part of this approval counts.approved = # of child approval activities that approved so far counts.rejected = # of child approval activities that rejected so far counts.requested = # of child approval activities that are pending approval`

Conditions

The conditions determine which transition runs after this activity.

Note:

Approval activities run as the user whose actions match the approve or reject conditions the workflow was waiting for and advances the workflow.

Table 2. Approval Coordinator activity conditions
Condition	Description
Approved	The users from the groups have approved the request based on the Wait for rules.
Rejected	The users from the groups have rejected the request based on the Wait for rules.

States

The activity state tells the workflow engine what to do with the activity.

Table 3. Approval Coordinator activity states
State	Description
Executing	The workflow engine starts the `execute` function of the activity.
Waiting	The workflow engine ignores the activity until a specific event to restart the activity is fired.
Finished	The activity finished running. See the result value for the outcome of the activity.
Cancelled	This activity, or the workflow that contains this activity, was canceled.
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