Introduction

Having something approved or "signed off on" may be the most common daily need in higher education. Ongoing routine approvals could include:

  • Faculty proposing a new course
  • Students hoping to have a certain course approved for their major
  • Allowing speakers or other guests to come to campus
  • Reserving space for meeting or other events
  • Verifying vendor contracts
  • Proposing new positions to HR
  • ...and more!


Challenges

  • Individuals in different offices may need to approve.
  • Requests often should be handled on a first-come, first-served and rolling basis.
  • Initial approval needs to be exported and shared with a variety of stakeholders.


Solutions

  • Assign individuals from any office to a routing step to verify all relevant groups approve.
  • Set each approval process to have an ongoing or rolling deadline to always leave the process open for submissions.
  • Use the batch PDF feature to download a packet that includes the initial request and all documented approvals (reviews).


Tips

  • Use a Bulletin Board posting to group similar types of approvals together than includes separate links to each form.
  • Use Applicant-Driven or Department-Driven routing steps to automate as many of the approvals as possible.
  • Run routing steps concurrently to collect all necessary signatures/approvals at the same time, without waiting for other approvers.
  • Customize the Data Grid by adding columns to quickly sort out "Approve" from "Do Not Approve" responses.
  • Customize your Grid view to maximize productivity. For example, the All tab could show new requests, and the Review tab could show only those approved at each routing step.
  • Utilize Progress Reports to collect any post-award info: Money spent, event attendance, invoices, etc.
  • To make year-end reporting easier, close rolling forms on a certain date (e.g., each month, each semester) and then copy the current version to open the next cycle.

Have more questions about this topic? Go to the Community Forum to pose the question to other users or submit a support ticket to InfoReady.