Manage workflow requests and approvals

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Important

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This article outlines how to manage requests and approvals that generated by a workflow in Microsoft Purview.

To view requests you've made or request for approvals that have been sent to you by a workflow instance, navigate to management center in the Microsoft Purview governance portal, and select Requests and Approvals.

Screenshot showing management center navigation table with the requests and approvals button highlighted.

You'll be presented with three tabs:

  • Waiting for a response - This tab shows the requests (tasks) and approvals that are waiting for you to act on.
  • Pending requests - You can view all the approval requests and tasks you've submitted in this tab.
  • History - All the completed approvals and tasks are moved to this tab.

Waiting for a response

This tab shows the requests (tasks) and approvals that are waiting for your action.

Screenshot showing requests and approvals page shown on the 'Waiting for my response' tab, with a list of requests awaiting responses from the user.

Select the request to take action.

Approvals

  1. To approve/reject a request, select the request and you'll be presented with the following window:

    Screenshot showing that the Waiting for a response tab is selected, and an open request has been selected. The Respond page is shown with some details, a space for a response, and a space for commentary.

  2. An approval activity has the following available responses:

    • Approved – An approver can mark the response as Approved indicating their approval for the changes proposed by the requestor.
    • Rejected - An approver can mark the response as Rejected indicating that they don't approve the changes proposed by the requestor.

  3. Optionally, select the value to see details of the request. In the screenshot below, it shows the term details. If the approval is for a data asset, you'll be able to view the details, as shown below.

    Screenshot showing the respond page is open, with the Value detail highlighted.

    Screenshot showing the request value has been selected, so the request details page is open showing an overview of the request, related information, and contacts.

  4. If there are updates, you'll also to be able to see the current value and proposed value.

  5. Choose your response, optionally add comments, and select Confirm.

    Screenshot showing the Respond page is open, with the response section Highlighted, a response selected, and the confirm button highlighted at the bottom.

Tasks

  1. To complete a task, select the task request and you'll be presented with the following window:

    Screenshot showing the task selected and the Respond page is open, with details, a status, and a place for comments.

  2. A task has the following statues:

    • Not started – This is the status of the task when it's initially created by a workflow.
    • In Progress – A task owner can mark the task as In progress to indicate that they're currently working on it.
    • Complete – Once the task is complete, a task owner can change the status as Complete. This marks the completion of task activity, and the workflow will now move to the next step.

  3. Select the correct status, add any comments, and select Confirm.

Reassign requests

You can reassign requests both approvals and tasks that are assigned to you to a different user.

  1. To reassign, select the request or task you're assigned and select Reassign in the following window.

    Screenshot showing the task selected and the Respond page is open, with details, a status, and a place for comments and reassign button.

  2. You'll be presented with a list of all the users who are assigned to the request. Select Assignee where your user name or the group you're part of is displayed and change it from your user name to the new user name. Select Save to complete the reassignment.

    Screenshot showing the request selected and the reassign user.

    Note

    You can only re-assign your user id or group you are part of to another user or group. The other assignees will be greyed out and will not available for re-assignment.

Pending requests

In this tab you can view all the approval requests and tasks that you've submitted.

Select the request to see the status and the outcomes for each approver/task owner.

Screenshot with the requests and approvals page shown on the 'My pending requests' tab, with a list of requests from the user that are waiting approver response.

Cancel workflows

You can cancel a submitted request and its underlying workflow by selecting Cancel request and its underlying workflow run.

Screenshot with the requests and approvals page shown on the 'My pending requests' tab, with cancel request.

Note

You can only cancel workflows that are in progress. When you cancel a request from the requests and approvals section, it will cancel the underlying workflow run.

History

All the completed approvals and tasks are moved to this tab.

Screenshot with the requests and approvals page shown on the 'History' tab, with a list of all requests and responses from the user.

Select an approval or task to see details and responses from all approvals or task owners.

Email notifications

Purview approvals and task connectors have in-built email capabilities. Every time an approval/task action is triggered in workflow; it sends email to all the users who need to act on it.

There are two kinds of emails that can be sent:

  • Actionable messages - if your workflow and email client meet the requirements, your approvers can receive single and aggregated actionable approval emails where they can leave comments and reject or approve requests within outlook. For more information, the approver can also select the approval item in the message to be taken to request details in the Microsoft Purview portal.\

    Sample actionable message from Microsoft Purview with the title. Approval and rejection buttons are available in the email.

  • Standard messages - if your workflow and email client don't meet the requirements, your approvers will receive single and aggregated approval emails that will direct them to the approval experience in the Microsoft Purview portal.

    Sample email from Microsoft Azure with the title 'Action required: Approve or reject the Microsoft Purview request.' Approval and rejection buttons are available in the email.

Users can respond by selecting the links in the email, for actionable messages they can submit responses directly in the email, or by navigating to the Microsoft Purview governance portal and viewing their pending tasks.

Next steps