These instructions outline how to approve knowledge articles to publish or retire if you are a designated approver for a particular knowledge article or knowledge base. There are several ways to do this.

1. Use link in Approval Request email

You will receive an email notification any time an article tied to your Service Owner Group is submitted for approval. 

Please Note: Delivery of email notifications can be impacted by your user-specific notification settings or filtering rules you have set up on your email client. If you plan to use email as your method of approval, please verify your notification settings and email filters will not prevent you from receiving Knowledge Approval emails.

Click the link at the bottom of the email to access the Approvals page.

Scroll to the bottom of the page and select the Approvals tab. A list of designated approvers will appear with Requested by each name. Right click on your name and select Approve., or click the checkbox next to your name, click the Action on Selected Rows dropdown menu, and select Approve or Reject.

Only one approver needs to approve an article for it to be published. If another knowledge base owner or manager approves the article first, you will see an Approval No Longer Required" message. You will also receive an additional email notification if another member of your Owner Group approves the article before you do.

2. Use My Pending Approvals homepage gauge

From your ServiceNow fulfiller homepage, select Add Content from the top left corner.

In the popup window, select Gauges > Approval > My Approvals and click one of the Add Here buttons to place it on your homepage. Exit the Add Content popup.

The My Approvals gauge is now visible on your homepage.

Clilck on Requested to view the approvals screen and Approve or Reject. A summary of the article is available on the Approvals screen, but you can also click the info icon next to the Knowledge Article number to view the full article.

Only one approver needs to approve an article for it to be published. If another knowledge base owner or manager approves the article first, you will see an Approval No Longer Required" message. You will also receive an additional email notification if another member of your Owner Group approves the article before you do.

3. Use My Approvals page

Navigate to Service Desk > My Approvals. All items you are eligible to approve will appear in a list view. If you have many approvals listed, you can use filters to display only knowledge articles and only items where approval is in Requested state.

Once your list is filtered appropriately, click on the approval to view the article. Select Approve from the top of the form to approve and publish the article.

To approve several articles at once, use the checkboxes on the left to select the articles you would like to approve. Scroll to the bottom of the list and click the Action on Rows dropdown menu. Select Approve to approve all the selected articles simultaneously.

Only one approver needs to approve an article for it to be published. If another knowledge base owner or manager approves the article first, you will see an Approval No Longer Required" message. You will also receive an additional email notification if another member of your Owner Group approves the article before you do.

4. Approve within the article

After clicking Publish on an article, navigate back to the edit view of the article to approve it. 

• Do a global search for the knowledge article number or name > Open/View the article > Click Edit in the top right corner of the article

Knowledge Managers can also navigate to the article using these techniques:

• Go to Knowledge > Knowledge Bases. Select the base where you created the article. From the Knowledge tab, search for the article number or description.
• Go to Knowledge > Unpublished. Search for the article number or description.

Once you are back on the edit view of the article, scroll to the bottom of the page and select the Approvals tab.

If you have permission to approve the article, your name will be listed in this tab. Right click on your name and select Approve, or click the checkbox next to your name, click the Action on Selected Rows dropdown menu, and select Approve or Reject.

Only one approver needs to approve an article for it to be published. If another knowledge base owner or manager approves the article first, you will see an Approval No Longer Required" message. You will also receive an additional email notification if another member of your Owner Group approves the article before you do.