Send subitems for review and approval
Monday.com is a great platform for managing various types of projects. However, as the number of project tasks grows, the main working space tends to get cluttered and disorganised due to the increasing number of items added to your Monday board.
With subitems, you can efficiently manage tasks associated with a main item, reducing the need to clutter your board with additional items.
For instance, suppose you're using your Monday board to manage all marketing initiatives for your team. It's important to keep the board organized and clear, so everyone can easily track the progress of each task. Some tasks may have sub-tasks, such as revamping a company website, which might include separate tasks like initial research, designing illustrations or writing text. As this task is relatively larger, it's crucial to use sub-items to organize the tasks included in the website revamp process. This way, your board stays organized, and each task is grouped together, minimizing the time spent searching for task progress updates.
In this guide, we will show you how to send subitems for review and approval using Approvals for monday.com.
Adding Approvals to a subitem
Open any subitem on your Monday board and navigate to the item view center by clicking the '+' button (A) at the top right corner of the subitem display window.
![Subitem a .png](../__attachments/1094713345/Subitem%20a%20.png?inst-v=8eadefad-d776-42b0-840b-c34038620c4a)
Once opened, click within the installed apps (B) menu on the left side. Once opened, Approvals will display along with other apps installed on your board.
![Subitem b.png](../__attachments/1094713345/Subitem%20b.png?inst-v=8eadefad-d776-42b0-840b-c34038620c4a)
Select ‘add to item’, and Approvals will be added to your subitem (C). Once you have added Approvals to your subitem, you will not need to repeat this process for existing or new subitems on your Monday board.
![Subitem c.png](../__attachments/1094713345/Subitem%20%20c.png?inst-v=8eadefad-d776-42b0-840b-c34038620c4a)
Approval status columns set up
Before you send any subitems for review and approval, we recommend setting up our Approval status columns. This will help streamline your approval process to monitor any subitems sent for approval.
To add approval columns, navigate to the approval settings (D) within any subitem.
![Subitem d.png](../__attachments/1094713345/Subitem%20d.png?inst-v=8eadefad-d776-42b0-840b-c34038620c4a)
The approval settings will open. We recommend you create new columns for the approval status and the approver's column (E) within the settings list.
![Subitem e.png](../__attachments/1094713345/Subitem%20e.png?inst-v=8eadefad-d776-42b0-840b-c34038620c4a)
Once you have selected ‘create new column', the approval status and approver columns will be added to your main monday.com board (F).
![Subitem f.png](../__attachments/1094713345/Subitem%20f.png?inst-v=8eadefad-d776-42b0-840b-c34038620c4a)
Once the approval columns have been added, you can rename their titles. Start by clicking on the column title and renaming the text to ‘approval status’ and ‘approvers’ (G).
![Subitem g.png](../__attachments/1094713345/Subitem%20g.png?inst-v=8eadefad-d776-42b0-840b-c34038620c4a)
Now that you have renamed the column titles, the next step is to customize the status labels, which will align with the Approvals workflow.
Start by clicking on any grey statuses in the approval status column. This will open the list of the default labels. To rename the labels, click on the pen icon (H).
![Subitem h.png](../__attachments/1094713345/Subitem%20h.png?inst-v=8eadefad-d776-42b0-840b-c34038620c4a)
The display window will open, where you can rename the status label text. We recommend renaming the labels to the following;
NOT STARTED
PENDING REVIEW
IN REVIEW
REJECTED
APPROVED
Once you've done this, click apply (I) to update the status labels.
![Subitem i.png](../__attachments/1094713345/Subitem%20i.png?inst-v=8eadefad-d776-42b0-840b-c34038620c4a)
Once you've set up and added the status columns, there's no need to go through this process again for any new subitems. The approval status and approver columns will automatically apply to the new subitems.
Request an approval on a subitem
To start the review process, access Approvals for monday.com within any subitem on your monday board. Then, add your approval by selecting the approval round (J) field.
![Subitem J.png](../__attachments/1094713345/Subitem%20J.png?inst-v=8eadefad-d776-42b0-840b-c34038620c4a)
Once the approval round is added, you can rename the approval title (K) to be more specific to your review by clicking the approval round text. Once configured, your changes will automatically be saved.
![Subitem k.png](../__attachments/1094713345/Subitem%20k.png?inst-v=8eadefad-d776-42b0-840b-c34038620c4a)
Next, you can add your approvers or approval teams by using the ‘+add approver’ (L) field. A drop-down box will display where you can select or search for your approvers or teams'.
![Subitem L.png](../__attachments/1094713345/Subitem%20L.png?inst-v=8eadefad-d776-42b0-840b-c34038620c4a)
Once you have selected your approvers, they will be added to the approval round. Once you have configured your approval process, select the start button (M) to activate the approval.
![Subitem M.png](../__attachments/1094713345/Subitem%20M.png?inst-v=8eadefad-d776-42b0-840b-c34038620c4a)
Need support? We’re here to help 🧡
If you have any questions or would like to speak with us about Approvals for monday.com, please contact our Customer Support team.