Review and approve agent output

When the Onplana Agent produces a deliverable, such as a document, a report or an analysis, the draft goes to the agent review inbox, where a person approves or rejects it. That covers work you start with Run with Onplana Agent on a task, and the status digests, agendas, release notes and EVM narratives a connected agent asks it for (see Draft reports, agendas and invites). This is the human-in-the-loop checkpoint for the Onplana Agent’s work.

Note

A connected agent (Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor or another MCP client) works differently: its changes apply directly, within its permissions, and are recorded under the agent’s name. To put a person in front of one of its changes, add a rule in Settings → Agents → Agent Policies that holds the call until a signed-in person approves it, decide what agents can delete, or ask the agent to propose the change instead: proposals wait on the Suggestions tab of this inbox until a person accepts them.

Opening a pending deliverable in the agent review inbox, reading the draft's account of which related tasks are done and which are still open, approving it, and seeing it move to the Approved list

Review a deliverable

1. Open the agent review inbox (the agents inbox in the navigation).
2. Open a pending item to read the deliverable in full. For document drafts you can edit the content inline before you decide.
3. Approve to sign off, or Reject if it is not right. You can add a note explaining your decision either way.

What approve and reject do

• Approve records a sign-off in the audit trail. The artifact stays live wherever it was created (its document folder or list). If you edited the draft before approving, your edited version is what is saved.
• Reject marks the artifact as rejected and records your note. By default the artifact is also moved to the recycle bin, so it no longer clutters the document folder or list, and you can restore it from Recycle Bin if you change your mind. Untick “Move the artifact to the recycle bin” before rejecting if you want to keep it in place, for example to reuse the draft as a starting point.

Tip

Rejecting is feedback, not permanent deletion. The rejection record and your note always stay in the inbox and the audit trail, and the agent reads them on its next run, so pair a rejection with a note that says what to fix.

See the agents overview on the main site for how delegation, task threads, and review fit together.

FAQs

Does everything an agent does need approval? No. The Onplana Agent’s deliverables (the things meant to be reviewed, like drafts and reports) go through the inbox. A connected agent’s changes, and routine actions like updating a task status or posting a progress comment, apply directly and appear in the activity log like any change, unless an approval rule in Agent Policies holds them for a person.

Can someone else approve my agent’s work? Anyone with access to the review inbox can review pending items. Approvals are recorded with who signed off, so accountability is preserved.

Is the approval recorded? Yes. Approvals write a sign-off row to the audit trail, and rejections record your note, so there is a durable record of every decision.

Best practices

1. Review the inbox daily. Stale pending items = stalled agent feedback loops. Daily scan keeps the loop tight.
2. Edit drafts inline before approving. Don’t reject + ask the agent to redo if minor edits suffice. The inline edit lands the approved version.
3. Always write a rejection note. The agent reads the note. Silent rejection produces silent re-tries.
4. Decide the discard checkbox by reuse value. Default is move-to-recycle-bin (safer + reversible). Untick when the draft is a useful starting point.
5. Track approval cadence as a metric. Long approval queues signal trust gaps. Address them.

Troubleshooting / common pitfalls

• Pending item disappeared. Someone else reviewed. Check audit log for decision.
• Edited draft, save lost. Edit before approve, not after. Navigation away loses unsaved edits.
• Rejected with discard, want it back. Artifact moved to recycle bin. Restore from there.
• Reject + restore = duplicate artifact. Restore creates a fresh artifact at original ID. If you re-approve, agent sees only the restored one.
• Agent ignores my rejection note. Note is read on next agent sync. Wait, or use Run with Onplana Agent.

How this combines with other features

• Review + Recycle bin. Discarded artifacts go to recycle bin. Rejection + discard is the default. See Restore from the recycle bin.
• Review + Agent assignment. Deliverables come from assigned tasks. See Assign work to an agent.
• Review + Audit log. Every decision audit-logged. See Read audit logs.
• Review + Task threads. Discuss the deliverable in the task’s [Agent] thread. See Talk to agents in task threads.

Coming from another tool

Tool	Mapping
GitHub PR review	Direct concept
Code review approval	Direct
Custom approval workflow	Onplana adds first-class agent surface
Microsoft Power Automate approvals	Adjacent
Asana proofing	Adjacent

Related

• Assign work to an agent, what generates deliverables
• Restore from the recycle bin, recover discarded
• Read audit logs, durable decision record
• Draft reports, agendas and invites with an agent, digests, agendas, release notes and EVM narratives that land here