ApproveThis manages your Assembla Integration approvals.

When Project Management Meets Approval Muscle

Let’s be real – most dev teams hate two things: context switching and waiting for approvals. Assembla keeps your code reviews, tickets, and merges organized. ApproveThis stops approvals from getting lost in Slack threads or buried under 47 unread emails. Together? They’re like that duo that shows up to a hackathon and actually ships something usable by Friday.

Here’s the play: Assembla handles the technical heavy lifting. ApproveThis handles the human decision-making. Connect them via Zapier, and you’ve got a system where code changes, tickets, or merge requests automatically trigger approval workflows – without your team needing to play tag across six different tools.

Why This Combo Works for Mid-Sized Companies

Companies between 50-5k employees hit a sweet spot: complex enough to need structure, but agile enough to hate red tape. Assembla users (looking at you, engineering managers) already track everything. ApproveThis adds the layer of accountability that keeps projects moving when:

• Legal needs to greenlight a third-party API integration
• Finance requires PO approvals before cloud infrastructure spend
• External clients demand visibility on milestone sign-offs

Bonus: ApproveThis approvers don’t need Assembla licenses. Huge for agencies or teams working with external stakeholders who shouldn’t have full access to your dev environment.

Three Ways This Integration Actually Gets Used

1. Merge Requests That Don’t Die in Committee

The Problem: Your senior dev approves a merge, but compliance requires a product manager’s sign-off. Two weeks later, someone’s digging through Jira comments to find who dropped the ball.

The Fix: When Assembla triggers a New Merge Request Review, ApproveThis pings the right people based on:

• Code repository (prod vs. staging)
• Estimated deployment impact (using ApproveThis’ calculated fields)
• Team-specific approval groups

Who Cares: SaaS companies pushing weekly updates. Agencies managing client codebases. Basically any team where “move fast” can’t mean “ignore governance.”

2. Code Comments That Actually Get Addressed

The Reality: Junior devs leave “TODO” comments. Seniors write novel-length feedback. 60% get ignored because there’s no system to track resolutions.

The Automation: When a New Code Comment hits Assembla:

1. ApproveThis checks if the comment’s tagged #critical or #security
2. Routes to lead devs via email (they can approve/reject without logging in)
3. Auto-escalates if no response in 24hrs (thanks to approval thresholds)

Use Case: Fintechs with audit trails. Healthcare apps where code quality = literal life or death.

3. Tickets That Don’t Require 3 Meetings to Prioritize

The Pain: New ticket comes in. Is it a P0 bug or a “nice-to-have” feature request? Cue the Slack storm.

The Flow: Assembla’s New Ticket triggers ApproveThis to:

1. Assign priority based on submitter (client vs. internal team)
2. Require PM + engineering lead consensus
3. Auto-approve low-risk tickets under $1k (using monetary thresholds)

Perfect For: MSPs managing multiple clients. E-commerce teams during peak season chaos.

Setting This Up Without Losing Your Mind

If you can configure a CI/CD pipeline, you can handle this. Here’s the 30,000-foot view:

Step 1: Zapier Does the Heavy Lifting

Connect Assembla and ApproveThis in Zapier. Choose triggers like:

• New merge request review
• Code comment added
• Ticket created

Step 2: Map Assembla Activity to Approval Logic

Example: When a merge request includes “AWS” or “data residency”, require CTO approval. Otherwise, auto-approve after 2 lead dev sign-offs.

Step 3: Let ApproveThis Handle the Human Part

Approvers get email links to review context + approve/deny. No Assembla access needed. Vacation mode? Delegates get auto-assigned.

Who Benefits (Besides Your Sanity)

Dev Teams

Fewer interruptions. Less “hey, did you see that comment from Tuesday?” More time actually coding.

Project Managers

Real-time dashboards showing what’s blocked vs. moving forward. No more status update meetings that could’ve been emails.

Execs

Audit trails for compliance. Plus, they only get pulled in when $$$ thresholds are hit (no more micromanaging $50 AWS charges).

Why This Isn’t Just Another Integration

Most approval tools bolt onto CRMs or accounting software. ApproveThis + Assembla fixes a specific pain point: development velocity vs. necessary bureaucracy.

Features that actually matter here:

• Email approvals – because your CTO isn’t logging into Assembla to check for merge requests
• Calculated fields – auto-flag tickets that exceed budget or impact critical paths
• Vacation delegation – because code freezes don’t care about your PTO

Ready to Stop Playing Approval Whack-A-Mole?

If your team’s bigger than 50 people, you’re past the point where “just @mention someone” works. ApproveThis + Assembla via Zapier gives structure without the rigidity of enterprise bloatware.

Register for ApproveThis and connect your Assembla workspace in under an hour. Or, if you’re the “talk to a human” type, book a demo – we’ll show you how to set up your first automation while you finish your coffee.