product-example checked

ServiceNow Ask for Approval action

Documents record-based approval requests, approval and rejection rule sets, individual or group approvers, manual approvers, due dates, output states, journal fields, automatic approval, rejection, or cancellation, and waiting-state safeguards.

Open source

Pattern Decisions This Source Supports

Pattern Supported decision Required contract Claim note
AI agent acts without approval Flag this anti-pattern when an AI agent or automation executes a high-impact side effect without showing and requiring approval for the exact action and payload first. The agent distinguishes read-only steps, draft steps, reversible local changes, and external side-effect steps before execution. Supports workflow approval rules, waiting states, due dates, approval outputs, and manual approver behavior.
Approval workflow Choose approval workflow when the core job is routing a submitted request through one or more authorized decisions before work can continue. Submitting creates a durable approval record with requester, target, requested action, version, approver rule, due date, and route state. ServiceNow supports approval and rejection rules, manual approvers, due dates, approval output states, journal fields, cancellation, and safeguards for waiting states.
Human approval gate Choose human approval gate when automation is paused at runtime and cannot execute the next step until an eligible human authorizes it. The gate belongs to a specific automation run, step ID, payload version, model or workflow version, target object, and approver rule. Supports workflow approval actions, waiting states, rules, due dates, and approval output states.

Evidence Role

This source is treated as product-example evidence. Use it to validate the decision rules above, not as a visual style reference.

Publisher: ServiceNow Docs. Last checked: .