Media Review and Approval Workflow
The Challenge we faced
A regulated educational institution required a formal review and approval workflow for media assets—including documents and video—prior to release through official channels. We designed and implemented a centralized workflow application that enabled content submission, expert reviewer selection based on subject-matter expertise, multi-stage approvals, and revision cycles to ensure media was reviewed, approved, and cleared in accordance with organizational and security requirements.
An existing workflow implemented in ServiceNow provided a starting point for media review, but it was not able to fully support the institution’s requirements. The platform lacked the flexibility to model complex review paths, enforce reviewer selection based on subject-matter expertise, and manage iterative revision cycles without extensive customization. As a result, approvals were often supplemented with manual coordination outside the system, reducing consistency and limiting auditability.
As media volume increased and release channels expanded, these limitations introduced compliance risk, delayed publication timelines, and made it difficult to demonstrate that all required reviews had been completed prior to release.
The Solution
We designed and implemented a centralized media review and clearance workflow that supported regulated publication requirements while reducing manual coordination and improving auditability. The system enabled users to submit media assets (documents and video), capture distribution intent up front, and route each submission through a controlled, multi-stage approval process with clear accountability at every step.
Media was stored using Microsoft Graph in a SharePoint document library, allowing the organization to manage assets in a familiar enterprise repository while enabling direct access through SharePoint when needed. The application maintained the workflow state and review history independently, ensuring the review lifecycle remained consistent even as assets were accessed through standard SharePoint channels.
Submitters authenticated through a single tenant and initiated a request by completing required metadata and uploading the associated media. During submission, they selected reviewers either directly by name or by choosing from subject-matter expertise “cards,” which streamlined expert identification and ensured reviews were routed to appropriate SMEs. Reviewers received email notifications containing secure links to the review interface, where they could approve or disapprove and provide structured feedback using a rich text comment editor.
The workflow enforced staged approvals and revision cycles. If a reviewer disapproved, the submission returned to the originator with comments for revision and resubmission, preserving the audit trail of decisions and feedback. Approved submissions progressed through the required chain—typically from SME review to supervisory approval and then to the designated security officer—supporting back-and-forth iterations as needed until all required approvers completed their actions.
Upon final clearance, the system routed the approved media package to the organization’s social media administration team. This final step ensured that only fully cleared assets moved to official distribution channels and that publication occurred in alignment with the outlets and intent specified by the original submitter.
The solution was implemented with a .NET Core API backend, a SQL Server database for workflow state and auditing, and a web-based front end integrated with Microsoft Graph for document storage and access control.