Glossary
Approval Chain
An approval chain requires a request to pass through a sequence of independent sign-offs, each performed by a different party, before it proceeds — a purchase requiring a manager's approval and then a separate financial reviewer's, for instance. This differs from dual control, where two parties act together at one moment, in that each link in an approval chain is a separate, sequential gate rather than a simultaneous joint action, and typically involves different people with different scopes of judgment at each stage.
The chain's value depends on each link actually exercising independent judgment rather than treating an earlier approval as sufficient reason to rubber-stamp their own — a chain where every subsequent approver simply defers to whoever went first collapses into a single effective check wearing the appearance of several.