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Coda Doctorate Review

Intro
Our company was looking for a way to create, approve, store and disseminate Policy Documents and Procedure Documents (also known as Standard Operating Procedures or SOPs). These documents will be reviewed on an annual basis (through an automation) and can be flagged or archived at any point during their life. Each document has the following individuals associated with it:
Document Creator
Responsible Party (if different than the creator)
Primary Approver
Secondary Approver
If a document is created on behalf of another individual, they are assigned as the Responsible Party which will direct future communications regarding revisions, etc. to them.
The vast majority of people accessing this document will be consumers – only viewing the
Approved Policies and Procedures
⁠
. Those who have more-elevated rights need to be indicated as such on the
Employee Details
⁠
page. Please see the steps below to set up the document up prior to use.
Document Preparation
The following setup tasks must be done prior to adding any documents to the database.
1. Setting up user access
As an admin you’ll need to give yourself elevated rights. On
Employee Details
⁠
, enter your name under the Employee Name column, then check adminAccess. Add all other content creators and give them editorAccess.
Note: For the sake of this demo I removed the hasAdminAccess filter from the setup tables. Once you have added yourself to the
dbEmployeeDetails
⁠
table I would recommend adding that filter to it and all other hidden setup tables to bolster security.
image.png
⁠
⁠
2. Setting up Departments
On
Department Abbreviations
⁠
, list out the departments along with your chosen department abbreviations.
3. Setting Up Approvers
On
Department Approvers
⁠
assign a Primary and Secondary Approver to each department.
Document Usage
Document Creation
To Create a new Policy Document or Procedure Document, on the Document Management page select New Document.
image.png
⁠
⁠
From here select the document type (Policy or Procedure) then select the department from the drop-down menus.
image.png
⁠
Then select the Add New button. A new window will open where you can give the document a title; add the relevant content; assign a responsible party or assign tags. Should any comment be required, that can be added here as well.
Document Management
Your Dashboard
Document statuses
Documents move through a series of statuses from creation through final approval. During that time, submitted documents can be marked as needing to be reviewed and resubmitted. After a document is approved, it can be flagged for annual review At any point a document can be archived, thereby removing it from view. A list of possible statuses is below:

Search
⁠

The initial status upon creation will be Awaiting Submission. This gives the document creator time to edit it prior to officially submitting it for approval.

Changing statuses
Some actions require a narrative explaining why the change is being requested. See
Explanation of Button States
⁠
below for which actions require or accept comments.

Explanation of button states
Search
Submit
comment
Comment Optional
why disabled
The status is not Awaiting Submission
AND you are not the Originator OR you are not the Responsible party
resolution
Ask to be assigned as the Responsible Party
Resubmit
comment
Comment Required
why disabled
Comment is blank
resolution
Provide summary of changes made
Approve
comment
Comment not Recorded
why disabled
You are not a Required Approver
resolution
Be assigned as the Required Approver for said department
Reject
comment
Comment Required
why disabled
You are the secondary approver and the primary has not yet approved
Comment is blank
resolution
Wait for the Primary Approver to Approve
Add an explanation as to why the document is being rejected to the comment field
Re-evaluate
comment
Comment Required
why disabled
Comment is blank
resolution
Explain why the document requires re-evaluation
Archive
comment
Comment Required
why disabled
Comment is blank
resolution
Explain why the document is being archived
⁠

The buttons do various tasks in the background. These automations send emails, change statuses and hide past versions from view.
Document Statuses
⁠
, below, describes what each status change does behind the scenes when a given button is pushed.

Document Statuses
Search
current state
initiator
button
action(s) taken
resulting state
current state
initiator
button
action(s) taken
resulting state
Awaiting Submission
Document Creator or Responsible Party
Submit
Changes document status
Under Review
Any Required Approver
Archive
Changes document status
effectively removes it from view
Archived
Under Review
Primary Approver
Approve
Lists Primary Approver in the Approved column
Notifies Secondary Approver
Under Review
Reject
Changes document status
Notifies Document Creator that they need to revise and resubmit
Resubmit
Archive
Changes document status
effectively removes it from view
Archived
Secondary Approver
Approve
Changes document status
Lists Secondary Approver in the Approved column
Notifies Originator and Responsible Party
Approved
Reject
Changes document status
Notifies Document Creator that they need to revise and resubmit
Resubmit
Archive
Changes document status
effectively removes it from view
Archived
Resubmit
Document Creator or Responsible Party
ReSubmit
Changes document status
Notifies Primary Approver
Under Review
Archive
Changes document status
effectively removes it from view
Archived
Approved
Any Required Approver
Re-Evaluate
Duplicates document
Increments version number by +.01
Changes document status
Archives old version hiding it from view
Notifies Responsible Party that they need to review the document and revise if need, then resubmit
Archived
Awaiting Submission
Archive
Changes document status
effectively removes it from view
Archived
Annual Review
Coda Bot
Automation
Changes document status
notifies Responsible Party
Awaiting Submission
⁠
Approving or Rejecting a document
If you are the primary or secondary approver for a given department, documents awaiting your review will display in your queue. To approve a document, after reviewing, simply click the Approve button. Similarly, to reject a document, click the Reject button after providing a reason in the comment field. See
Document Statuses
⁠
for details.
Flagging a document for revision
An approved document can be flagged for Re-evaluation as required.
Note that there is an automation set up to flag documents for review 365 days after they are created specifically for this purpose.
Archiving a document
Should a document no longer be relevant, it can be archived. This removes it from view, but does not delete any of the data. To do so, provide an explanation as to why the document is being archived and then click the Archive button.
Comment Log
All comments are stored on the
Comment Log
⁠
, which are then filtered per each document. This is a combination of user-added comments as well as a log of automation-based comments.


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This is not the way.
Try clicking the ⋯ next to your doc name or using a keyboard shortcut (
CtrlP
) instead.