Knowledge article approvals

In BMC Helix Business Workflows, when a case agent needs to publish, cancel, or retire a knowledge article, it is sent for approval to a specified user group. Users from the specified approval group can approve or reject the approvals.

Users with the Knowledge Coach role configure approvals for knowledge articles. A Knowledge Coach defines the business logic for approvals, creates approval mappings and flows, and assigns permissions to users to approve and reject approvals. Approval mappings define the status that triggers an approval, and the status to which the knowledge articles move to after an approver's action.

If a Knowledge Coach chooses not to define a knowledge approval mapping record or a matching approval flow, the status of the knowledge article automatically changes to the next status. For example, the status of a knowledge article changes from Publish approval to Published without any approval.

The following examples show how approvals work for publishing and retiring knowledge articles:

A Knowledge Author creates an article about maternity benefits. The article is sent for approval to the HR and Finance approvers. Once approved, the article is published.
A Knowledge Author needs to retire an old travel policy knowledge article. The article is sent for approval to HR approvers. When the HR gives the approval, the article is retired.

Knowledge article approval process

The following image shows how the knowledge article approval process works:

The following steps describe the process in detail:

When the status of a knowledge article changes to Publish approval, Retire approval, or Request Cancelation, an approval is triggered.
If self-approval is configured, the knowledge article moves to the next status in the lifecycle. If self-approval isn't configured, the application checks if an approval flow is configured.
If approval flow isn't configured, the knowledge article moves to the next status in the lifecycle. If an approval flow is configured, the knowledge article is sent to an approver.
When the approver approves a knowledge article, it moves to the next status in the lifecycle.
When the approver rejects a knowledge article, it moves to the previous status from which the article was moved.

Knowledge article approval types

A Knowledge Coach configures self-approvals or approval flows to approve knowledge articles. The approval types for knowledge articles are similar to the approval types that are available for cases.

Self-approval

Self-approvals are automatically processed by the system. They contain expressions that determine for which knowledge articles the self-approval needs to be run.

A Knowledge Coach can configure self-approvals in the following ways:

With process—To evaluate additional expressions or to perform additional tasks. After a knowledge article matches the self-approval expression, the self-approval process is run, and the expression defined in the process is run, and the knowledge article is approved. Otherwise, the knowledge article is rejected.
For example, all articles from the legal department need approval before being published. In the approval flow, the Knowledge Coach defines the expression as 'Operational Category Tier 1’ = “Legal”. When the self-approval process is run, this expression is met, and the knowledge articles are approved.
Without process—To automatically approve a knowledge article that matches with the defined expression.

Learn how to configure self-approvals in Configuring self-approvals for knowledge articles.

Approval flows

By using an approval flow a Knowledge Coach groups similar types of approvals and define how they should be executed. The Knowledge Coach can choose a specific person or group of users who can approve or reject knowledge articles. The Knowledge Coach can define approval flows under the Default Knowledge Flow group.

The Knowledge Coach can use the following types of flows:

Level Up Approval Flow—Use this manager approval flow to specify the levels of approvals that a knowledge article requires.
General Approval Flow—Use this flow to define multiple approvers for a knowledge article. It also determines whether all, one, or N% of the approvers must approve the knowledge article.

For more information about configuring approval flows, see Defining a chain of approvals for knowledge articles.

Knowledge article status transition

The following image shows the status transition of knowledge articles:

The following steps define the status flow in detail:

When a case agent creates a knowledge article, it is by default in the In progress status.
When the case agent saves the knowledge article, it moves to the Draft status.
When the case agent sends the knowledge article for review, the status changes to SME Review. The status then changes to Content Review and to Proof reading.
After the knowledge article is reviewed, it is sent for publishing. An approval is required for publishing and the knowledge article moves into the Publish Approval status.
If the approver rejects the approval, the status of the knowledge article moves back to the previous Proof reading status. When the approver approves the request, the knowledge article is published and the status changes to Published.
When a case agent wants to cancel a published article, the case agent changes the status to the Request Cancelation status.
If the approver approves the cancelation of the published article, it moves to the Canceled status and then to Closed.
If the approver rejects the cancelation, the knowledge article moves to the Published status.
When a case agent wants to retire a published knowledge article, the case agent must move it to the Retired Approval status.
If the approver approves the retiring of the knowledge article, the status changes to Retired. If the approver rejects the retiring of the knowledge article, it moves back to the Published status.