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Quick Summary: Promotion workflows let you assign structured career advancement checklists to your direct reports, track their progress in real time, and approve or reject completion requests when they’re done.

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Overview

A promotion workflow is a structured checklist of requirements an employee must complete to demonstrate readiness for career advancement. Your organization’s administrators create and publish these workflow templates. As a manager, you assign them to your direct reports, monitor their progress, and approve completions. Each promotion workflow is made up of one or more content blocks — which may include written requirements, reference links, attachments, and individual tasks the employee must check off. Employees work through the workflow at their own pace. When they’ve finished all tasks, they submit the workflow for your review. You then approve or reject the submission. Promotion workflows give your team a transparent, auditable record of what advancement criteria exist and whether an employee has met them. This helps standardize how promotion decisions are made across your organization and gives employees a clear picture of what is expected of them. Managers can assign workflows to team members, monitor their progress, and approve or reject completion requests. Administrators configure the workflow templates and can scope them to specific departments, teams, or sites.
Note: Only administrators can create, edit, and publish promotion workflow templates. If no templates are available to assign, contact your SkillsDB administrator.

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Prerequisites

Before working with promotion workflows, make sure:
  • Permission level: Manager role or higher in SkillsDB
  • Template availability: At least one promotion workflow template has been published by an administrator
  • Team access: You have direct reports assigned under your account in SkillsDB

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Understanding Promotion Workflow Statuses

When a promotion workflow is assigned to a team member, it moves through four statuses:
StatusWhat it means
To DoWorkflow has been assigned; the employee has not yet started
In ProgressThe employee has begun completing tasks
Approval RequestedThe employee has completed all tasks and submitted for your review
CompleteYou have approved the submission; the workflow is closed
Note: Some promotion workflows are configured to require both manager approval and administrator approval before reaching Complete status. In those cases, your approval advances the workflow to a pending admin review state.

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Assigning a promotion workflow to a team member

Assign a promotion workflow when a team member is ready to begin working toward a specific promotion or advancement milestone.
  1. Select People from the Team section in the left sidebar.
  2. Select the team member’s name to open their profile.
  3. Select the Qualifications tab.
  4. Locate the workflow you want to assign in the list.
  5. Select Assign next to that workflow.
When you assign a workflow, the system assigns the current published version of that template to the employee. The status is set to To Do and the employee can immediately begin working through the requirements. You can assign multiple promotion workflows to the same employee simultaneously. This is useful when a team member is pursuing advancement across more than one competency area.

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Removing a promotion workflow assignment

To remove a promotion workflow from a team member:
  1. Navigate to the team member’s profile and select the Qualifications tab.
  2. Locate the assigned workflow.
  3. Select Unassign next to the workflow.
Warning: Unassigning a promotion workflow permanently removes the employee’s progress record for that workflow, including all completed tasks. This action cannot be undone.

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Reviewing and approving a completion request

When an employee completes all tasks in their promotion workflow, they submit it for your review. The workflow status changes to Approval Requested and a notification appears in your Inbox. To review and act on a completion request:
  1. Select Inbox from the left sidebar to view pending approval requests.
  2. Select the relevant notification to open the workflow detail view.
  3. Review the completed tasks and any attached documentation the employee has provided.
  4. Select Approve to accept the completion, or Reject to return it to the employee.
When you approve:
  • The workflow status changes to Complete.
  • A completion record is saved with the approval date and approving manager’s name.
  • The employee receives a notification confirming the approval.
When you reject:
  • The workflow status returns to In Progress.
  • The employee receives a notification that the request was rejected.
  • The employee’s previously completed tasks remain checked and they can continue working or make corrections before resubmitting.
Note: You can also navigate directly to the employee’s profile and select the Qualifications tab to access a pending approval request, without going through the Inbox.

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Advanced options

Workflow versions Promotion workflow templates are versioned by administrators. When a template is updated, existing employee assignments are not automatically changed — employees continue working on the version they were originally assigned. New assignments always receive the latest published version. If a team member is working on a significantly outdated version of a workflow, you can unassign and reassign the workflow to update them to the current version. Doing so will clear their existing progress data. Org unit scoping Administrators can scope promotion workflows to specific departments, teams, sites, or other organizational units. If an expected workflow template does not appear when you go to assign it, confirm with your administrator that the workflow has been scoped to your team or department. Recurring workflows Some promotion workflows are configured to repeat on a schedule (for example, annually or after a set number of days from completion). When a recurring workflow is completed and approved, a new assignment is automatically created for the employee based on the configured schedule.

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Common Questions

The employee continues working on the version of the template assigned to them. Template changes do not affect in-progress assignments. To move an employee to a newer version, unassign and reassign the workflow. This clears their existing progress.
No. The approval action is only available when the workflow status is Approval Requested. Employees must complete all tasks and explicitly submit for review before you can approve.
When you reject a submission, the status returns to In Progress. The employee’s previously completed tasks remain checked. They can make corrections and resubmit when ready.
No. Employees can only view promotion workflows that have been explicitly assigned to them. They cannot browse or preview available templates.
Certifications track externally issued credentials (like licenses or vendor certificates) and require evidence uploads. Promotion workflows are internally defined checklists of requirements your organization creates to assess promotion readiness. Both have an approval process, but they serve different purposes.
Yes. The team-level qualifications view shows all promotion workflow assignments across your direct reports in a single list. You can filter by status, workflow name, or team member.

Viewing Your Team

Navigate your team’s profiles and data in SkillsDB

Manager Assessments

Conduct structured skill assessments for your direct reports

Certification Tracking

Track and approve certification submissions for your team

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Need More Help?

If you need additional assistance: