When you're away – on vacation, for example – your pending workflow tasks can stall. With workflow task delegation, you can hand your workflow responsibilities to a colleague (the delegate) for a set period. During that period, your delegate can perform the workflow actions you're entitled to perform, and your pending tasks appear in their task list.
Delegation starts and ends automatically at the dates you set – no one needs to remember to switch it off.
Note: Workflow task delegation must be activated on your AODocs domain. Learn more: Manage workflow task delegation on your AODocs tenant. If you can't see the Delegations menu, contact your administrator.
Automatically generated table of contents
What delegation does – and doesn't do
While a delegation is active, your delegate can:
- perform the workflow actions you're entitled to perform (approvals, validations, and other transitions);
- see your pending workflow tasks in their own task list.
Delegation does not give your delegate anything else:
- no access to documents they can't already open;
- no roles, no sharing or editing rights, no administration rights.
Important: AODocs doesn't check your delegate's permissions. Make sure the person you choose has access to the documents your tasks concern – otherwise they won't be able to see them.
Every action your delegate performs is recorded under their own identity, on your behalf: the document history and the audit log show both who acted and for whom.
Delegate your tasks before an absence
1. In the user menu, select Delegations. The Delegate tasks during absences page opens.
2. Click Create delegation.
3. In the panel:
- Absentee: this is you.
- Delegate to: select the person who will handle your tasks.
- Starts on: set when the delegation begins. It can start now or at a future date.
- If required, click Add end date and set when it ends.
4. Save.
screen: The "Delegate my tasks" panel with the Absentee (current user), Delegate to, Starts on and Ends on fields, and the permission disclaimer banner.
Tip: Delegations without an end date are allowed, but we recommend always setting one – the delegation then ends by itself when you're back.
When the delegation starts, your delegate receives an email listing your pending workflow tasks, with a link to their task list. They're notified again when the delegation ends.
Rules to know
- You can have only one delegation at a time: delegations from the same person can't overlap.
- The start date can't be in the past, and the end date must be after the start.
- Delegations can't be chained: you can't delegate while you're handling someone else's tasks, and you can't delegate to someone who is delegating their own tasks away during the same period. AODocs rejects these setups when you try to save.
Track, edit, or stop your delegations
On the Delegate tasks during absences page, the My delegations tab shows:
- My tasks are delegated to – the delegations you created. You can edit or delete them here.
- I handle the tasks of – the delegations that name you as the delegate (read-only). Active ones are tagged as started.
What you can change depends on whether the delegation has started:
| Delegation state | What you can do |
| Scheduled (hasn't started) | Edit everything, or delete it. |
| Active (started) | Change the end date only (extend or shorten), or stop it now. |
| Ended | Nothing – it's kept as read-only history. |
When you stop or delete a delegation, your pending tasks revert to you.
Handle someone else's tasks as a delegate
If a colleague delegates their tasks to you:
- You receive an email when the delegation starts, listing their pending workflow tasks.
- Their pending tasks appear in your task list alongside your own, for exactly the delegation period.
- You perform their workflow actions the same way as your own. Learn more: Perform workflow actions.
Note: The document history records that you performed the action on behalf of the absentee, under your own name. When the delegation ends, the inherited tasks disappear from your task list automatically.