Introduction
Approve exists because a person should decide whether a change is acceptable to the business. This article explains what the approver reviews, who is allowed to approve, and what recording that approval means for the project.
Everything before this point has produced evidence. This is the stage where somebody reads it and takes responsibility for the decision.
The steps, in order
The approver works through the evidence available at this point and then records the decision.
- Open the project and read the approved functional and technical designs.
- Review the test results and the evidence saved against the project.
- Review the training documentation produced for the people who will use the solution.
- Review the project record, including what was attached at intake and the decisions taken along the way.
- Record approval on the project.
[ Screenshot placeholder — the Approve step on a project, showing the evidence available for review and the action that records approval, ]
The gate
The gate is a recorded human approval. It is the one gate in the lifecycle that the product cannot satisfy on its own: somebody has to read the evidence and decide. Until approval is recorded against the project, the project is not eligible for promotion.
Who approves or satisfies it
Approval is given by an approver the customer has assigned. That assignment is the customer’s decision and the person who accepts a change into their own business should be the person who says it is acceptable. Neither Bluefort nor the delivery partner decides who that is.
Consultants sign in with their own identity rather than through a shared account, so what a person can see and do in ARVO Studio is exactly as authorised as the person requesting the build. That is also why the name recorded against a decision means something.
What the approval means is worth stating plainly. It is a statement that the designs describe what was wanted, that the test evidence supports the claim that the build satisfies those designs, and that the customer accepts the solution for promotion into Production. It is not a formality, and it is not something ARVO can do on the approver’s behalf.
What is added to the project record
The approval is written into the audit trail with the user who gave it and the timestamp at which it was given. It joins the designs, the test results and the training documents already held against the project, and it appears in the receipt as a material event. When the project is promoted and the record is sealed, this is the entry that answers the question of who accepted the change.
Every approval in the lifecycle, covering the designs, this review and the promotion that follows, is recorded against a named approval authority. It is recorded rather than implied, so there is never a question afterwards about who accepted what.
The evidence pack itself is assembled automatically as the build proceeds rather than reconstructed by a consultant afterwards. By the time the approver opens the project, the evidence is already there to be read.