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How To Approve Decisions

For reviewers and approvers who are asked to approve on a Tech Decision in Stackgini.

Contents
  1. Overview - Your role as an Approver
  2. How you get notified about pending Decisions
  3. Reviewing a Decision
  4. Approving a Decision
  5. Requesting changes or rejecting a Decision

 

1. Overview - Your role as an Approver

When a colleague finishes preparing a Tech Decision (which application to adopt or reject, and why), they submit it for approval. If you've been named as an approver, you're asked to review the recommendation and its reasoning, then either approve it, request changes, or reject it.

You may be asked to approve in one of two ways:

  • As an individual approver. You were added to this specific Decision by name. Important: as an individual approver you can block a Decision - your vote carries veto weight before all other approvers can approve.
  • As a member of an approval group or team. The group has rules such as "1 approval needed · 1 rejection allowed," meaning the group passes once it reaches the required number of approvals, or is blocked once it hits the allowed number of rejections.

A few things worth knowing about how approvals resolve:

  • First-to-threshold: as soon as a group reaches its approval threshold (or its rejection threshold), that stage is decided and the remaining members' votes are skipped - so a stage can complete before everyone has voted.
  • Ordered stages: stages can depend on each other (e.g. "Security Approval depends on EA Approval"), so your stage may stay Upcoming until an earlier stage finishes.
  • A Decision is only finalized once all required approvals are in. Until then it sits in Pending Approval.

Your goal as an approver: confirm the Decision is sound, well-justified, and acceptable from your area of responsibility - and record that judgment.

2. How you get notified about pending Decisions

When a Decision is submitted and it's your turn to review, Stackgini flags it for you. You can find Decisions awaiting your input in two reliable ways:

  • From the top-level "Decisions" page (left navigation): open it and filter by Awaiting my approval to see what needs attention. Each row shows the Decision name, status, the application(s), the approvers, the Initiative, and when it was last updated.

  • From a direct link to the Decision shared with you or included in the email notification. 

3. Reviewing a Decision

3.1. Opening the Decision

Open the Decision from the Decisions list (or your notification link). At the top you'll see the title, the status (e.g. Pending Approval), and the application the Decision concerns.

The Decision is organized into three tabs:

  • Overview - the recommendation and the written reasoning.
  • Documents - supporting file attachments.
  • Comments & Activity - discussion and the full history.

In the right-hand sidebar you'll find an OVERVIEW panel (status, template, created date), the COLLABORATORS (who authored it), and the APPROVAL panel showing every approver and their state - including yours.

3.2 Understanding the context and document attachments

Spend your review on the Overview tab. Read:

  • The summary & reasoning sections defined by your organization’s template. These have been prepared by the demand owner and collaborators for you.
  • Affected Applications - each application carries a clear recommendation by the Demand Owner, ADOPT or REJECT, with a rationale beneath it.

For deeper context:

  • Documents tab — open any attached files (contracts, security questionnaires, vendor material). If nothing is attached you'll see "No documents uploaded."

Initiative Snapshot — the Decision is built on a point-in-time snapshot of the Initiative's evaluation data captured when the Decision was created, so what you're reviewing reflects the facts as they stood at decision time. 

3.3 Using the Decision Assistant

The Decision Assistant - the "What would you like to know? — Ask anything about this Decision" box in the right sidebar - is the fastest way to get up to speed before you vote. It answers questions grounded in this Decision and its attached documents.

  1. Type a question in "Ask a question about this Decision…" - for example:
    • "Summarize this decision in one sentence."
    • "What are the main risks that arise from the data processing agreement with the provider?"
    • "Why was this application recommended over the alternatives?"
    • "What does the attached security document say about data residency?"
  2. Press Send and read the answer in the chat panel.
  3. Ask follow-ups as needed, and use the 👍 / 👎 buttons to rate answers.

This is especially useful when you're reviewing a Decision you didn't author and want a quick, reliable orientation. The AI answers are 100% grounded in the actual initiative data prepared by your team. No hallucinations.

3.4 Viewing the audit trail

Open the Comments & Activity tab to see the Decision's full history - your audit trail. It shows, in chronological order:

  • When the Decision was created and from which template.
  • Edits, comments, and approval events, grouped into iterations (Iteration 1, Iteration 2, …) so you can see exactly what changed between review rounds.

You can also add a comment here (type @ to mention and notify someone) - handy for asking the author a clarifying question without formally requesting changes. Use the Download button at the top of the Decision if you need an exported copy for your records.

4. Approving a Decision

When you're satisfied with the Decision:

  1. Use the approval control on the Decision to record your approval.
  2. Your approval is logged in the activity trail and your status updates in the APPROVAL panel.

What happens next:

  • If you're in a group or an approval team, the group passes once it reaches its required number of approvals (first-to-threshold - remaining members may then be skipped).

Once all required stages/approvers have approved, the Decision's status becomes Approved and it's considered finalized. 

5. Requesting changes or rejecting a Decision

If the Decision isn't ready to approve, you have two options:

Request changes - when the Decision is basically on track but needs revisions before you can approve.

  • The Decision returns to the author as Changes Requested, which opens a new iteration.
  • Explain what needs to change (in your change request and/or a comment) so the author knows what to address.
  • After they revise and re-submit, it comes back to you for another look, and the activity trail shows what changed between iterations.

Reject - when the Decision should not proceed.

In both cases, be specific about your reasoning - the author and other approvers rely on it to act or to understand the outcome.