How group and approval process changes affect assigned approval processes

Last update: 2022-07-26
  • Created for:
  • Admin

This article explains what happens when an approval process is already associated with tasks, issues, projects, templates, or template tasks and a Workfront administrator (or a user with administrative access to approval processes) does one of the following:

  • Changes the approval process (group-level) from one group to another
  • Changes the group associated with the project
  • Changes the approval process from group-level to system-level
  • Changes the approval process from system-level to group-level

The article also describes what happens when moving or copying tasks or issues associated with a group-level approval process between two projects from different groups.

For information about the 3 types of approval processes you can use in Workfront, see Approval process overview.

NOTE

If the project, or its tasks or issues are already associated with a group-level approval process using group-level custom statuses, changing the group might create a conflict between the approval statuses of the previous group and those existing at the system level.

For example, if an approval process contains two paths, one for a system-level status and a second one for a group-level status that equates to the same system-level status, changing the group of the original project will result in Workfront having trouble understanding the group-specific status that might not exist on the second group. In this case, you will encounter an error.

Consider removing the group-level approval processes on the project, or its tasks or issues before updating the group of the project.

For information about creating group-level approval processes, see Group-level approval processes.

For information about creating a group-level custom status, see Create or edit a group status

Changing a group-specific approval process from one group to another

The following scenarios occur when a group-specific approval process is already being used on an object and someone reassigns it to a different group:

Area or object where the approval process was attached Approval object Change in the approval process for the object or area
Project or template approval Project Becomes a single-use approval process
Task or template task approval Task Becomes a single-use approval process
Issue approval Issue Becomes a single-use approval process
Tasks area in the Edit Project or Edit Template box Task

The Task Default Approval Process field is reset to N/A.

By default, no approval processes are associated with new tasks on the project.
Queue Details section of a project or template Issue

The Default Approval field is reset to N/A.

By default, no approval processes are associated with new issues or requests on the project.
Queue Topic section of a project or template Issue

The Default Approval field is reset to N/A.

No approval processes are associated with new issues or requests on the project by default.

Changing the group associated with a project

When someone changes the group associated with a project to different group, the following occurs:

Area or object that has the approval process already attached Approval object Change in the approval process of the object or area
Project or template approval Project Becomes a single-use approval process and the status associated with it updates to match a similar status for the new group.
Task or template task approval Task Becomes a single-use approval process and the status associated with it updates to match a similar status for the new group.
Issue approval Issue Becomes a single-use approval process and the status associated with it updates to match a similar status for the new group.
Tasks area in the Edit Project or Edit Template box Task

The Task Default Approval Process field is reset to N/A

By default, no approval processes are associated with new tasks on the project
Queue Details section of a project or template Issue

The Default Approval Process field is reset to N/A

By default, no approval processes are associated with new issues or requests on the project
Queue Topic section of a project or template Issue

The Default Approval Process field is reset to N/A

By default, no approval processes are associated with new issues or requests on the project

Changing an approval process from group-level to system-level

When someone changes the Group option in a group-specific approval process to “All groups,” the approval process becomes system-wide and the following occurs:

Area or object where the approval process was attached Approval object Change in the approval process of the object or area
Project or template approval Project No change
Task or template task approval Task No change
Issue approval Issue No change
Tasks area in the Edit Project or Edit Template box Task

No change to the approval process but, by default, it is associated with new tasks on the project
Queue Details section of a project or template Issue

No change to the approval process but, by default, it is associated with new issues or requests on the project
Queue Topic section of a project or template Issue

No change to the approval process but, by default, it is associated with new issues or requests on the project

Changing an approval process from system-level to group-level

When someone changes the availability of a system-wide approval process from “All groups” to a specific group, the approval process becomes group-specific and the following occurs:

Area or object where the approval process was attached Approval object Change in the approval process of the object or area
Project, task, issue, template, or template task that belongs to the group of the approval process

Project, task, or issue

 No change
Tasks area in the Edit Project or Edit Template box for a project or template that belongs to the group of the approval process Task

No change to the approval process but, by default, it is associated with new tasks on the project
Queue Details section for a project or template that belongs to the group of the approval process Issue

No change to the approval process but, by default, it is associated with new issues or requests on the project
Queue Topic section for a project or template that belongs to the group of the approval process Issue

No change to the approval process but, by default, it is associated with new issues or requests on the project
Project, task, issue, template, or template task that belongs to a group other than the group of the approval process

Projects

Tasks

Issues

 Becomes a single-use approval process
Tasks area in the Edit Project or Edit Template box for a project or template that belongs to a group other than the group of the approval process Tasks

The Task Default Approval Process field is reset to N/A.

By default, no approval processes are associated with new tasks on the project.
Queue Details section for a project or template that belongs to a group other than the group of the approval process Issues

The Default Approval field is reset to N/A.

By default, no approval processes are associated with new issues or requests on the project.
Queue Topic section for a project or template that belongs to a group other than the group of the approval process Issues

The Default Approval field is reset to N/A.

By default, no approval processes are associated with new issues or requests on the project.

Moving or copying a task or an issue to a project with a different group than that of the approval process

Moving or copying a task or an issue from a project to another might affect existing approval processes on the task or the issue depending on the groups of the two projects. The following table illustrates the scenarios that might exist:

Original task or issue approval process Groups of the two projects Changes in the approval process after the task or issue is moved to another project
Single-use approval process associated with a system-wide status Projects are in the same or different groups No change
Single-use approval process associated with a group-specific status Projects are in different groups The approval remains a single-use approval process and the status associated with the approval updates to match a similar status for the new group.
System-wide approval process Projects are in the same or different groups No change
Group-specific approval process Projects are in the same group No change
Group-specific approval process Projects are in different groups and the groups have different group-specific statuses The approval becomes a single-use approval process and the status associated with the approval updates to match a similar status for the new group.
Group-specific approval process Projects are in different groups and there is a status with the same key in the new group as the status associated with the approval process from the first group No change
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