Approval of Confluence pages to comply with ISO
Asked by Michelle Oliveri:

In order to be compliant with ISO 9001-2008, we need to ensure that only approved content is available to our employees. Currently, drafts are written by Content Managers and sent to the Quality Manager for approval. The drafts are not officially published until approved by the Quality Manager. Does anyone know how we can incorporate this approval workflow in Confluence? Basically, we would be tracking who approved the content as well as what is allowed to be visible to the masses.


Answers:
author: Michelle Frese
body: Hi Michelle,

I am working on using Confluence for our electronic document management system and meet ISO 9001, 13485, and 21 CFR Part 11 requirements.

I am using the following add ons to meet ISO requirements:

- Comala workflows (approvals)

- Comala Publishing( Published space for released documents)

- Archival plugin (Archive obsolete documents)

I may need to add an additional add on to meet 21 CFR requirement:

- Enterprise password policy ( to lockout after x amuont of failed attempts)

Good luck

-Michelle


author: Davin Studer
body: There are a couple of addons that can do page approval processes.

[Page Approval](https://marketplace.atlassian.com/plugins/net.customware.confluence.plugin.pageapproval/server/overview) (free ... just page approval)

[Comala Workflows](https://marketplace.atlassian.com/plugins/com.comalatech.workflow/server/overview) (paid ... allows for doing all kinds of workflow related tasks)

comments: author: Michelle Oliveri
body: Hi Davin,

Thanks for the tip! I'll have to check them out.

Regards,  
Michelle


author: Irina_Bel_Stiltsoft_
body: Hi [@Michelle Oliveri](/t5/user/viewprofilepage/user-id/1065191)

I shared the case for organizaing ISO documentation in Confluence of one of our clients [in this article](https://stiltsoft.com/blog/2022/04/how-to-organize-documentation-for-iso-certification-in-confluence/). Maybe it can be relevant to you as well.


author: Steven F Behnke
body: Atlassian uses Page Restrictions to "hide" and "publish" drafts. This isn't a true "approval system" since you don't know who removed the restriction/or "approved" the page.

Outside of this approach, you'll need to buy or develop a plugin.

The biggest problem with the plugin approach is that pages do not easily have the ability to show an "older" draft: You will always view the **latest** draft of a page. You could potentailly use Scroll Versions to create a process around this, since that one plugin does show specific drafts.

comments: author: Michelle Oliveri
body: Hi Steven,

Thanks for your reply! I know that we can normally view older drafts in Page History and compare them to newer drafts. Does this feature go away when using a plugin?

Regards,

Michelle


author: Steven F Behnke
body: No, as far as I know no core feature is removed.


author: Blake Hodder
body: We are beginning the process of setting up our JIRA cloud for ISO 9001. Any tips would be appreciated. Michelle, were you able to get up and running?


author: Ricardo de Azevedo
body: +1


author: Shannon Meehan _K15t_
body: Hi [@Steven F Behnke](/t5/user/viewprofilepage/user-id/781476) , [@Michelle Oliveri](/t5/user/viewprofilepage/user-id/1065191) and others,

I work for K15t and we're the vendors of the Scroll Versions app that you mentioned, but I actually think our [Scroll Documents app](https://marketplace.atlassian.com/apps/1217608/scroll-documents-for-confluence?hosting=cloud&tab=overview) fits better for the purpose of page or even multi-page approvals and tracking.

There are more details in [our documentation](https://help.k15t.com/scroll-docs/1.4.0/server/review-approve-and-track-changes-to-a-document-172592643.html), but the way it works is you can define a page or multiple Confluence pages as a single document, manage it through an approval process, save versions, and even compare versions side-by-side.

The activity log feature will show you exactly when versions were saved, workflow statuses were transitioned, and when page were updated so you can track changes over time.

If you have any questions, we'd be happy to help or show you a demo of the app. Just get in touch with us: hello@k15t.com.

Cheers, Shannon (K15t)


author: Chris Rollins
body: I appreciate this is a very old thread, however would be intereseted in how you got on and what implementation you went for in the end [@Michelle Oliveri](/t5/user/viewprofilepage/user-id/1065191)

Cheers Chris


author: marc -Collabello--Phase Locked-
body: [@Chris Rollins](/t5/user/viewprofilepage/user-id/4296560) This thread is indeed an old thread. It references solutions on server/cloud.

If you are on cloud, the functionality is not built into Confluence, and you have to use addons from the marketplace. We made [Document Control for Confluence Cloud](https://marketplace.atlassian.com/apps/1217765/document-control-for-confluence-cloud?tab=overview&hosting=cloud) . However, depending on your specific requirements, you might need to combine addons.


author: Michelle Oliveri
body: Hi [@Chris Rollins](/t5/user/viewprofilepage/user-id/4296560)! I remember this thread! :) We've been using Confluence for our QMS documents. We love the revision control and the fact that it records what changes were made and who made them. Also, it's easy to locate documents to show an auditor.

We didn't come up with an elaborate solution for approval, but we did add a few things that have helped. We designated Process Owners for various work instructions. A Process Owner would add his/her name and the date of approval in a "Document Information" section of the work instruction (we made a simple table for this). You could then trace this update in Page History if you wanted to confirm that it truly was the Process Owner who added their approval. A 2nd approver is also included (such as a Quality Manager) and that person would also add their name and date in the table. If major changes are needed, the Process Owner updates the document and then updates the date of approval. The 2nd approver does the same after review.

Also, on the Confluence document, we added a "Document Control Note" that says something like "The only 'controlled' version of this instruction is available here: (add the URL for the document in Confluence). All other versions are considered 'uncontrolled.'" Basically, the document in Confluence is considered the "current" version. If the document gets printed, it will show this note on the paper copy.

I know these are very basic solutions, but they have been working for us. Hope that helps!

Cheers,

Michelle


Tags: approver