Change Request Process Flow – Show Cross for Skipped States

[sumeetchava]

In the Change Request process flow, I have a scenario where I skip a state in between the process.

For example, if the process flow is:

Access → Authorize → Scheduled → Implement → Review--> Closed/Cancelled

and the Change moves from Access directly to Cancelled; I want the Process Flow to show:

Access ✓ → Authorize ✓ → Scheduled ✗ → Implement ✗ → Review ✗--> Cancelled ✓

Instead, currently, the Process Flow shows the subsequent states as checked (✓) even though those states were never actually completed.

Is there a way to configure or customize the Change Request Process Flow so that states that are skipped are displayed with a cross (✗) rather than a check mark?

If this is possible, could someone please point me to the relevant Process Flow configuration or script that controls this behaviour?

Thanks

[Dr Atul G- LNG]

it show tick OOTB when state skip

[sumeetchava]

Thanks @Dr Atul G- LNG ,

Thanks for confirming. I’ll raise a HI Support case with ServiceNow to check if there is any supported way to achieve this, so that skipped states can be shown with a cross (✗) instead of a tick (✓).

[Dr Atul G- LNG]

keep me posted mate

[sumeetchava · Accepted solution]

Hello, Below is the ServiceNow HI Support case response,

ISSUE SUMMARY:
Change Request Process Flow displays skipped states as completed
SOLUTION PROPOSED:

1) This is expected OOTB behaviour of the Change Request Process Flow formatter.We checked with internal team and the confirmed .

Reason for the behaviour:

The Process Flow formatter is primarily driven by the stage model, not by whether the record physically visited every state. When a Change Request reaches a terminal state such as Cancelled, the formatter considers the lifecycle complete and marks the preceding stages as completed in the visual flow.

Therefore, when a Change moves directly from New/Assess to Cancelled, the formatter can display:

Assess ✓ → Authorize ✓ → Scheduled ✓ → Implement ✓ → Review ✓ → Cancelled ✓

Even though the record never actually entered Authorize, Scheduled, Implement, or Review.This does not indicate that those states were traversed. It only indicates that the process has reached a final outcome and the process flow has been completed.

2) Why are the intermediate stages shown as ✓?
The Process Flow formatter does not interpret those stages as "visited states". Instead, it interprets them as lifecycle milestones that are considered complete once the record reaches the terminal stage (Cancelled).

So the formatter is showing:
Completed lifecycle path ✓
Not actual state history ✓

The actual state transitions should be verified from:
State field audit history
sys_history_line records
Activity Stream
Audit history

These will correctly show that the Change was cancelled without moving through the intermediate states.

Can the stages be shown as ✗ instead?
Not through OOTB configuration.