What can administrators, initiators and approvers do in a Plan approval project?

An approval project involves three roles:

• Administrators set the project up and decide who takes part.
• Initiators upload the material that needs approval.
• Approvers review it: they comment, ask for changes, approve or reject.

This article explains what each role does and what the settings behind them mean.

What each role does

Administrator

• Creates approval projects. Create new sits at the top of each project group. A Place project also needs the archive in Place that it uploads to.
• Decides who takes part, and manages the project itself, from the three-dot menu next to the project name. It holds Choose collaborators, Edit project, Duplicate project, Archive project and Delete project.

Initiator

• Clicks Upload assets in the project and uploads a file. The asset appears in the project with the status Pending review.
• Cannot change the status of their own asset unless the administrator has turned on Initiators can review their own materials. The status menu is greyed out for them.
• Uploads a new version with the Upload new version button on the asset. The button appears after an approver sets Needs change. If the administrator has turned on Relaxed approval workflow for the project, it is also available while the asset is still Pending review, so the initiator can replace a version they spot an error in without waiting.

Approver

• Opens the asset and leaves comments in the Comments panel on the right.
• Changes the status with the menu in the top-right corner of the asset: Pending review, Approve document, Needs change, Reject document.
• Needs change requires at least one comment first, and asks which subject needs changes (for example Visual + EXIF or Metadata).

How to see who the collaborators are

Open the project. Initiators see an Upload assets button in the top-right corner.

Click the avatar next to it to open Project collaborators. The Initiators and Approvers tabs list who holds each role.

On an asset, the Review process button in the header shows the approval type, the subjects of approval and the reviewers for that asset.

Collaborators settings (administrators)

Open the project and click the collaborators icon in the top-right corner, or use the three-dot menu next to the project name and choose Choose collaborators. The dialog has two tabs: Initiators and Approvers. Click Save after each change. Changes to approver settings apply only to assets uploaded after the change.

Initiators tab

• Initiators can review their own materials: off by default. When off, the status menu is disabled for the person who uploaded the asset, even if they are also an approver. When on, they can change the status of their own asset.
• Initiators can edit materials of others: when off, the dialog states that all initiators can post new assets to the project but only update their own work. When on, a Select initiators who can edit materials of others section appears with Users, User groups and Excluded users.

Approvers tab

Choose Single review or Multi-stage review.

Single review contains:

• Subjects of approval (Place projects only): Visual + EXIF and Metadata. The selected subjects are shown as tags on each asset.
• Everyone has to approve: changes the approval type shown on the asset from Anyone can approve to Everyone has to approve.
• Let Initiator select from Approvers
• Select approvers: Users, User groups, Excluded users.
• Message for new approvers: when on, a required Message contents field appears. The text is attached to the email sent to new approvers.

Multi-stage review splits the review into steps, so the asset can be approved by different people in each step. Click Add review stage; each stage has its own name, subjects of approval, approver settings, approvers and message.

Project settings (administrators)

Open the three-dot menu next to the project name in the left panel and choose Edit project.

Place projects:

• Project name
• Advanced deadline settings: when on, you set a Response time in days and hours, and can tick Restart countdown with new version and Working time only.
• Relaxed approval workflow: lets initiators modify material while it is Pending review or Needs change, and lets approvers restore a review that is already Approved or Rejected.
• Download during review: allows downloading submitted material while it is under review.
• Archive in Place: the Place archive the project uploads to. Only Place projects have this setting.

Produce projects have Project name, Advanced deadline settings and Relaxed approval workflow only. They have no archive setting and no Upload assets button.

Projects in the Local hierarchy have one more required setting, Local unit. It opens the organisation tree (for example countries and offices) and decides where in the organisation the project is available.

The same menu also offers Duplicate project, Archive project and Delete project.