Managing Repository Cycle Groups

To access the Repository Configuration area, Cycle Groups page you must be assigned a Repository Role granting Manage Repository permission. See Assigning Security Roles for more information.

Cycle Groups provide a way to manage the set of designated document reviewers, approvers, endorsers and acknowledgers by managing groups of users that are stored in a common repository location.

Cycle Groups listed in the Repository Configuration Area, Cycle Groups page, are also known as "Named Cycle Groups". 

NEW The ability to add User Groups to Cycle Groups is a new feature. Review, Approve and Endorsement cycles lock in the cycle members when the cycle starts.  The Cycle manager can push cycle group membership changes from the Cycle Groups page, or pull changes from an in-progress cycle from the Manage Cycles page. Acknowledgement cycles always reflect the latest Cycle group members.

Adding Users or Groups to a Cycle Group

To add a user or group to an existing cycle group, do the following.

1. Open the Repository Configuration area, Cycle Groups page
2. Click a Cycle Group to which you want to assign users to expand the groups display
3. Click EDIT within the Cycle Group display  
4. Click ADD USER / GROUP
5. Click the Search button and select users or groups you want to assign to this cycle group. If desired, locate the users or groups you want to assign in the list by typing in the search box ¹.
6. Click CONFIRM SELECTION 
7. Click SAVE CHANGES 

Specifying Cycle Group Completion Requirements

Each cycle group defined can also specify requirements as to how the users and groups within the cycle group must complete the activities within the cycle. While the number of settings available for completion requirements depends on the number of users within a cycle group or subgroup (described in Adding Subgroups to Cycle Group), there are three types:

• All members need to complete the action in any order – This is the default setting for cycle groups. It requires that all members and groups (and any recursive groups within groups) that comprise the cycle group must complete the cycle action (review, approve, or endorse a document) for the cycle to be complete. This can work well for small cycle groups, but as any cycle group gets larger, it can become more difficult to get everyone in it to complete the cycle in a short time. This is where the other options become useful.
• All members need to complete the action in this order – This option requires that the users and groups must complete the cycle action in the order in which they are listed within the group. This is useful for situations where the roles within the group are tiered, as in a management hierarchy. If this option is selected, when someone rejects the document in question, the remaining people in the order will not need to perform a review, approval, or endorsement. The cycle action does not need to be performed by those further up in the hierarchy if it has been rejected at a lower level. To specify the order, you can drag individual users and groups within the cycle group up or down in the list. See Setting a Cycle Group Action Sequence for more information.
• <number> of <total count> need to complete the action – This set of options lets you require only a specific number of users or groups within the cycle group to complete the cycle action. The number of options of this type depends on the number of users and groups within the cycle group. It is only available when two or more users or groups are present in the cycle group list, and the maximum value of <number> is one less than <total count>. These options allow you to create some flexibility in the set of users and groups in the cycle group by specifying a portion of a larger group that can sufficiently complete a cycle action.

By setting different types of completion requirements for groups or subgroups within a cycle group, you can set up completion requirements that are sufficiently complex for very large-scale organizations and efforts. For more information on using subgroups, see Adding Subgroups to Cycle Group).

Be aware that if a given cycle group (say, Group A) contains another cycle group (Group B), the completion requirements for Group B will still apply to that group, regardless of the completion requirement setting for Group A.

While Acknowledgement cycles can also use cycle groups, all of the participants are collected up when the cycle starts, and each member gets to acknowledge once (even if they appear in multiple included groups).  Group Completion Requirements do not apply to Acknowledgement cycles.

Creating a New Cycle Group

To create a new cycle group, do the following.

1. Open the Repository Configuration area, Cycle Groups page
2. Click CREATE CYCLE GROUP 
3. Type a name for this cycle group in the Group Name box
4. Click ADD USER / GROUP
5. Click the Search button and select users or groups you want to assign to this cycle group. If desired, locate the users or groups you want to assign in the list by typing in the search box. 
6. Click CONFIRM SELECTION 

7. Click CREATE CYCLE GROUP 

   

   You can also ad subgroups to a new cycle group, which allows for more complex completion requirements. See Adding Subgroups to Cycle Group for more information

Setting a Cycle Group Action Sequence

To set up a sequential set of cycle actions, do the following:

1. Open the Repository Configuration area, Cycle Groups page
2. Click a Cycle Group to which you want to create an action sequence
3. Click EDIT within the Cycle Group display
4. In the drop-down list box above the group member list, select All members need to complete the action in this order

5. In the list of users and groups, click and drag the group members into the desired sequence, top to bottom

6. Click SAVE CHANGES 

   

   Be aware that if a given cycle group (say, Group A) contains another cycle group (Group B), the completion requirements for Group B will still apply to that group, regardless of the completion requirement setting for Group A.

NEW Acknowledgement Cycles consolidate all of the users from all the groups included in a Cycle group and each user is included once. Unlike Review, Approval and Endorsement cycles, Acknowledgement cycles do not support completion requirements. All users are required to acknowledge in any order.

Adding Subgroups to a Cycle Group

The Subgroups feature lets you add multiple subgroups to a cycle group, with each having its own completion requirements setting. This capability lets you set up complex completion requirements for cycle actions, or increase the flexibility of cycle completion without sacrificing quality control. For example, you can

• Create subgroups for departments where a single member can confirm or reject the action in question for the department
• Combine subgroups that require all members to perform the cycle action with subgroups that require only one or two members to do so
• Combine subgroups that must complete the action in a specific order, allowing them to do so in parallel to save time
• Create subgroups within subgroups for very complex cycle scenarios

To add a subgroup to a new or existing cycle group:

1. Click ADD SUBGROUP on the "Create or Edit Cycle Group" page
2. In the resulting Subgroup entry, click ADD USER / GROUP 
3. Add users or groups to the subgroup
4. Click CONFIRM SELECTION 

5. Click SAVE CHANGES or CREATE CYCLE GROUP
   

   

   You can add subgroups to subgroups recursively, to infinity. Don't get carried away!

To remove users, groups, or subgroups from a cycle group, do the following:

1. Click a Cycle Group to edit
2. Click EDIT within the Cycle Group display
3. Locate a user, group or subgroup that you want to delete from the cycle group, then click the trash can icon

   

4. If you make a mistake, click CANCEL
5. Click SAVE CHANGES

Updating Users in an In-Progress Cycle Group

NEW Locked in Cycle Participants are a new feature. For details, see the In-Progress Cycle Group Participants topic

Renaming a Cycle Group

To rename a Cycle Group that's not one of the three default groups (which you cannot rename or delete):

1. Click the Cycle Group name to expand the display
2. Click Edit  within the Cycle Group display
3. Next to the Cycle Group name, click the pencil icon 

   

4. Replace the Cycle Group name with a new name and click SAVE CHANGES

Deleting a Cycle Group

To delete a Cycle Group that's not one of the three default groups (which you cannot rename or delete):

1. Click the Cycle Group name to expand the display
2. Click the DELETE button within the Cycle Group display
3. Click DELETE again in the dialog box to confirm the deletion