Configure Reviewer Lists using Symbolic Reviewers

Using Symbolic Reviewers in the Request Approval routing process enables the system to determine the appropriate approver when a specific employee submits a request. This also enables you to reuse Reviewer Lists and reduce the amount of configuration necessary for routing requests to approvers. For example, when managers change jobs or new managers are hired, you only need to assign the appropriate Symbolic Reviewer to the particular manager and the system finds approvers based on the existing Reviewer List.

You define Symbolic Reviewers to use for symbolically identifying the correct approver — for all requests that use a Reviewer List or Approval Settings — to configure how the system routes requests to different approvers. For example, you can define a Symbolic Reviewer called OpenShiftApprover to enable the system to find the appropriate managers for approving an open shift request. The Symbolic Reviewers are then assigned to individual managers through their roles. You can configure Reviewer Lists to reference Symbolic Reviewers and route appropriate approvers based on filters.

With this configuration, employees can see who is responsible for approving their request at each step in the process. Notifications can be configured to use the custom tag Current Approver(s) that lists the approvers in the request notification. Managers can receive requests based on the employees who send the requests or based on the shift in the request. For example, when an employee outside of a manager's primary location requests an open shift, the system can determine that the manager who is responsible for the shift is the approver and not the employee's Reports To manager.

Approval Settings must be configured on the request subtype. For more information, see Approval Settings.

Define Symbolic Reviewers to associate with Reviewer Lists.

  1. Go to Administration > Application Setup > Common Setup > Symbolic Purpose (Formerly Reviewer Purpose).
  2. Click to add a new purpose. For more information, see Symbolic Purposes.
  3. In Name, enter the name of the Symbolic Reviewer. For example, OpenShiftApprovers.
  4. In Description, enter a description for the Symbolic Reviewer. For example, Symbolic reviewer for Open Shift requests.
  5. In Type, select Symbolic Reviewer.
  6. Select Active.

  7. Click to define additional Symbolic Reviewers.

  8. Click Save.

Assign one or more Symbolic Reviewers to individual managers through their defined manager roles in People Information.

Note: Any manager with multiple manager roles who the system identifies as a request approver can receive notifications and take action on them when they are logged in to the system with any of their other roles.

  1. Go to Maintenance > People Information.
  2. Select the manager from the list.

  3. In Timekeeping, select Manager Role – Assignments.

    Note: If Manager Role - Assignments does not display in the People Record, navigate to Administration > Application Setup > System Configuration > System Settings > Global Values tab and set the global value global.peopleeditor.multiplemanagerroles.enabled to True.

  4. Click Assign Role Attributes.

  5. In the Type/Attribute table:

    1. Click .

    2. In Type, select Symbolic Reviewer.

    3. In Attribute, select the Symbolic Reviewer to assign to the manager.

    4. Click to assign additional Symbolic Reviewers to this role if necessary.

    5. Click Apply.

You can configure Reviewer Lists to reference Symbolic Reviewers and route appropriate approvers based on filters.

  1. Go to Administration > Application Setup > Common Setup > Reviewer Lists.
  2. Click New to create a new reviewer list or select an existing reviewer list and click Edit or Duplicate. For more information, see Reviewer Lists.
  3. In Name, enter the reviewer list name. For example, 2-step to OpenShiftApprovers and Manager.
  4. In Description, enter a description for the reviewer list. For example, 2-step approval process for managers who have access to the open shift and then the submitter's manager.
  5. In Type, select Scheduling Requests.
  6. In Steps:

    1. For Step 1, in Reviewers, select a Symbolic Reviewer.

    2. (Optional) In the Filter list, select how the request will be routed to the Symbolic Reviewer.

      Note: Filters are available only for Symbolic Reviewer types. Filtering always uses the Access Levels that are assigned in the Role where the Symbolic Reviewer has been assigned. The system does not prevent the same Symbolic Reviewer from being applied to more than one role for a given manager.

      • None (default): No filtering is applied. Any manager who has the selected Symbolic Reviewer assigned to them in a role can approve the request. When locating an approver for the Symbolic Reviewer (for example, for an open shift request approver), the system finds any manager that has that Symbolic Reviewer assigned to a role. Any of those managers can take action (approve or reject) on the submitted request.

        • Use None when a limited number of employees are responsible for approving a specialized type of request.

      • Filter by Job: Restricts the managers who can approve the request to those who have access to the job in their organizational set. You can use this for requests that use shifts (such as Open Shift, Swap Shift, Request to Cover) and also for time-off requests. This enables the requests to be routed to the manager responsible for the job being worked, and not necessarily to the submitter’s Report To manager.
      • Filter by Submitter: Restricts the managers who can approve the request to those who have access to the submitter (the employee who submits the request) through the combination of their Employee Group and their specified HF Query for Home Employees.
      • Filter by Recipient: Only used for Swap Shift and Request to Cover requests. Restricts the managers who can approve the request to those who have access to the recipient (the employee who accepted a Swap Shift or Request to Cover request from the submitter) through the combination of their Employee Group and their specified HF Query for Home Employees.

    3. Click Add to add additional reviewers to Step 1.

      4. When there are multiple approvers assigned to a step in the request process, the system uses either/or logic to find the appropriate approver. For example, if you specify two OpenShiftApprover symbolic reviewers in Step 1, one with the filter set to Filter by Submitter and the other with the filter set to Filter by Recipient, the system defines the approver as any manager who has been assigned as an OpenShiftApprover and has access to either the submitter or the recipient.

      Any of the multiple approvers assigned to a step can approve that step of the request in order to move the request to the next step. For example, if there are three approvers assigned to Step 1, only one of them has to approve the request, not all of them.

      If the system does not find an appropriate manager when using the filtering, or if a manager is inactive, automatic actions configured in Approval Settings and Approval Step Settings are used to update the request approval process. For more information, see Configure Multiple Approvals.

    4. Click to add another step to create a multi-step approval process, then add one or more reviewers to that step.

      For example, you could specify Step 1 with an OpenShiftApprover symbolic reviewer with the filter set to Filter by Submitter and specify Step 2 with an OpenShiftApprover symbolic reviewer with the filter set to Filter by Recipient. The system defines the approver in Step 1 as any manager who has been assigned as an OpenShiftApprover and has access to the submitter, and defines the approver in Step 2 as any manager who has been assigned as an OpenShiftApprover and has access to the recipient.

    5. In Recipients, select an employee to receive notifications about the request but who cannot take any actions on the request. You can choose Symbolic Reviewers to receive notifications and optionally select a filter to use for routing the notifications.

    6. Click Add.

    7. Click to add additional recipients.

    8. Click Save & Return.

You can configure request notifications to include a Current Approver(s) custom tag. This tag is used to show all the managers that the system identified as approvers for the request's current state. Employees and managers can see who the approver is for each step during the approval process.

For more information about configuring notifications, see Configure Notifications for Schedule Requests

  1. Go to Administration > Application Setup > System Configuration > Workflow Notifications.
  2. Select the notification type for the request and click Edit.
  3. In Control center fields, add an Approvers label or edit the existing Approvers label.
  4. Click Insert Custom Tag.
  5. Select the group, then select the associated Current Approver(s) tag.
    6. Group Tag
    Open Shift Open Shift Current Approver(s)
    Request to Cover Cover Current Approver(s)
    Shift Swap Swap Current Approver(s)
    Time Off Current Approver(s)
  6. Click Ok.
  7. Click Save.

The following personas are used in the example use cases: 

Name Persona Description
Antoinette Abbott Employee

Facilities employee; can submit Open Shift requests in her home location of Facilities, and her transfer set allows her to also work in Dining
Brian Black Employee

Facilities employee; can submit Open Shift requests in her home location of Facilities, and his transfer set allows him to also work in Dining
William Martin Manager

Reports To manager for Antoinette and Brian; can accept open shift requests from Antoinette and Brian
Jack Martin Manager

Facilities manager; can accept open shift requests from Antoinette and Brian
Bob Martin Manager

Facilities manager; cannot see Antoinette or Brian; they are not included in the Hyperfind Query for Home Employees defined for his default role

Diane Martin Manager Dining manager

The following system configuration is used in the example use cases: 

  • A Symbolic Reviewer called OpenShiftApprover is defined in Reviewer Purposes.
  • A Reviewer List is configured with the reviewer defined as OpenShiftApprover with Filter by Job selected. The Reports to Manager is configured to receive notifications.
  • Diane Martin has the OpenShiftApprover symbolic reviewer assigned and has the Higher Ed Dining Employee Group assigned.
  • William Martin and Jack Martin both have the OpenShiftApprover symbolic reviewer assigned and the Higher Ed Facilities Employee Group assigned.
  • Bob Martin has the OpenShiftApprover symbolic reviewer assigned but has a Hyperfind Query of Reports to Tony H Peterson, which Antoinette is not included in.

Antoinette submits a request for an Open Shift in Facilities.

  • Diane Martin is identified as the approver because she is responsible for shifts in Dining, while Antoinette's manager William Martin is notified of the request.
  • In her Open Shift request notification in the Control Center, Antoinette can see that the approver listed is Diane Martin. Once Diane approves the request, Antoinette can see the assigned shift in her calendar.
  • William Martin can view the Open Shift request notification in the Control Center, but he cannot take action on it. He can see that the approver listed is Diane Martin.

Antoinette submits a request for an Open Shift in Facilities.

  • Bob Martin has the OpenShiftApprover symbolic reviewer assigned but because he has a Hyperfind Query of Reports to Tony H Peterson, which Antoinette is not included in, Bob Martin is not listed as an approver on the request.
  • Either William Martin, who is Antoinette's manager, or Jack Martin, who can accept Open Shift requests from Antoinette, can approve the request. In her Open Shift request notification in the Control Center, Antoinette can see that the approvers listed are William Martin and Jack Martin. Once one of them approves the request, Antoinette can see the assigned shift in her calendar.