Approval processes rarely start out complicated. They begin with good intentions and simple steps.
Someone needs sign-off, so they send an email. A manager reviews it, forwards it to finance, who then
loops in operations. Over time, more stakeholders get added. More checks are introduced.
What started as a three-step process quietly evolves into something with twelve steps, multiple handoffs,
and no one quite remembers why all of them are necessary.
The real problem isn't the number of steps. It's that complexity grew without structure.
There's no system holding it together, just a collection of emails, spreadsheets,
and verbal agreements about who needs to approve what.
This blog walks through a real project where we helped a client move from that exact situation
to a single Power App that handled the entire process.
The Original Problem Setup
Before the solution, approvals moved through a patchwork of tools and communication channels.
Requests started in email. Details were logged in an Excel file that lived on a shared drive.
Approvers received reminders through a mix of email threads and direct messages.
Some approvals happened verbally and were documented later, sometimes not at all.
Multiple departments were involved in every approval. Procurement needed to review budget alignment.
Operations had to confirm resource availability. Senior management provided final sign-off.
But there was no centralized view of where any request stood at a given moment.
If someone wanted a status update, they had to ask around or dig through email chains
hoping to piece together the timeline.
Delays were constant. Requests sat waiting because an email got buried in someone's inbox.
Follow-ups happened manually, often days after a request should have moved forward.
When approvals finally came through, there was no reliable record of the decision trail
or the reasoning behind it.
Key Issues With the 12-Step Process
The core problems became clear when we mapped out how approvals actually moved through the organization.
Every single transition between steps required manual intervention.
Someone had to remember to forward the request, update the tracker,
and notify the next person in line.
There were twelve of these touchpoints, and each one was an opportunity for something to stall.
There was no single source of truth. Information about a request existed in multiple places:
the original email, the Excel tracker, follow-up messages, and sometimes just in someone's memory.
Reconciling these sources to understand the current state took time
and often produced conflicting answers.
The process also created heavy dependency on specific individuals.
Certain people knew how things worked and maintained the unofficial systems
that kept approvals moving. When they were unavailable, requests piled up.
New team members struggled to understand the process because it wasn't documented
anywhere in a way that reflected reality.
Auditing and reporting were nearly impossible.
When leadership wanted to know average approval times or identify bottlenecks,
the data didn't exist in any usable form.
Piecing it together meant manually reviewing emails and spreadsheets,
a task that could take days and still miss critical information.
The Power App Solution
The solution centered on consolidating the entire approval process into a single application.
Users submit requests through a structured form that captures all necessary information upfront.
No more incomplete emails or back-and-forth to gather missing details.
Once submitted, the approval flow runs automatically.
The system routes requests to the appropriate approvers based on predefined rules.
If procurement needs to review requests over a certain amount,
that happens without anyone having to remember to include them.
Notifications go out automatically when action is required,
and reminders follow if a request sits too long without movement.
All data lives in a centralized database connected to the app.
Every request, every approval decision, every comment or attachment exists in one place.
Users can check the real-time status of their submissions
without sending a single follow-up message.
Approvers see a clean dashboard of pending items that need their attention.
The change wasn't just about automation.
It was about visibility and control.
Managers can now see where requests are getting stuck
and how long each step actually takes.
The system maintains a complete audit trail automatically,
showing who approved what and when,
along with any notes or justifications they provided.
Outcome and Business Impact
The results showed up quickly after deployment.
Approval times dropped significantly because requests no longer sat waiting
for manual handoffs.
What used to take weeks in some cases now completes in days
or even hours for straightforward requests.
Transparency improved across the board.
Requesters know exactly where their submissions stand.
Approvers have clear queues and context for each decision.
Management has visibility into the entire pipeline
without having to ask for status reports.
Error rates went down because the structured input prevents incomplete submissions
and the automated routing eliminates the risk of requests going to the wrong person.
Missed actions became rare because the system doesn't forget to send reminders
or lose track of pending items.
Perhaps most importantly, adoption was strong.
Users preferred the app because it made their work easier.
Submitting a request took less time than drafting an email with all the details.
Approvers appreciated having everything in one place
instead of scattered across their inbox.
Moving From Complexity to Clarity
The goal of this project wasn't simply to automate what existed.
It was to simplify the process itself and then build a system
that supported the simplified version.
Automation without simplification just speeds up a broken process.
What made the difference was taking the time to understand
what actually needed to happen versus what had accumulated
over years of ad hoc additions.
Not every step in the original twelve was necessary.
Some were redundant.
Others existed only because there was no better way
to share information at the time.
If your approval processes still rely on emails and spreadsheets,
there's a more effective path forward.
We help organizations redesign these workflows into simple,
scalable Power Platform solutions that reduce friction
and improve outcomes.
