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Parallel Flow for Approvals - Some help...

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Posted on by TheJayB

Hi Guys,

Didnt know where to post this but as im just fact finding.. I thought this would be best. Ive looked around the net but wasnt able to find anything that covered this particular way of doing things... but if someone has one or knows of one I would be very keen to see it. Im pretty new to the Power Automate, Apps, etc. suite of software.. but I can learn.

Issue - Ive created an approval flow (based on the sign off process that's included as part of Teams/Sharepoint). I am able to select a file in the document library where my Test Flow is located... run it... and you then get to input however many approver names that are required (manually input for now)... then a mail gets sent to all... and people can reject or approve. Works great... but I need more 🙂 Im sure I am smart enough to figure this out without having to pay some development costs for what im trying to achieve (which is basically what im being asked for now).

Basically I need/want the approvers to be able to respond whenever (not in a sequence). If we have 5 approvers... it goes to all of them at the same time awaiting the response. I need everyone to be able to respond... and a rejection should not stop the flow.. but allow all approvers to "have their say". The flow would end once all have responded. That should then mean if all 5 want to reject the approval they can... not just one person rejecting and then everything stopping. In my Sharepoint library I have created columns to capture approvers (in one column with multi line text.. i don't capture the approvers as separate "columns" currently. If I have requested 5 people approve a document.. each of their names is listed in the Approver column, against the document name the flow was run against. I also have an approval status and date for the responses.

I usually like Reza's videos.. and whilst he covers multiple approvals.. its done in sequence... and I need to allow all the approvers the chance to respond to the request... not just the people who respond up to the first rejecter.

Hopefully that makes sense. Im sure its possible.. just reaching out to see if anyone has some nice videos that might touch on this subject... ive seen a few that are similar.. but usually have separate columns for each approver.

Just seeing if any nice people out there can point me in a direction. Happy to share further info if needed.

Thanks

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srduval 1,760 Moderator on at

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There is an option in the approvals action card for wait for all responses or wait for first response.

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TheJayB 47 on at

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So currently I have the option set to - Approve/Reject - Everyone must approve. The only options they need is accept/reject... I just dont want the flow to end if someone says "Reject" (which it does now). If I change that option to Custom Responses - Wait for all Responses... add Approve and Reject as the 2 options... that should then allow for all 5 users to Reject if they want, but the flow will continue until all have responded?

Are you able to tell me if the Sharepoint list still updates when someone does approve/reject... or does that only happen once everyone has responded? And lastly... obviously everyone does eventually have to approve the document, etc. I guess the simple way is just to rerun the flow against that file and go through the process again. Ill try do some testing and see what happens.

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TheJayB 47 on at

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Just done some testing.. and that option does certainly help... but the list doesnt update until everyone responds by the look of it. Is there anything I can do with that? I like how it works with the Custom Responses... wait for all... but I need it to update the list once someone's responded so it can be seen in Sharepoint. Im trying to work on adding in a step that would populate the list when intially sent... to list the approvers... and the Status would be "Pending" until they approve/reject and the list is updated.

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srduval 1,760 Moderator on at

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I think to capture responses as they come in, is to take your list of people who need to approve, assuming this is aggregated into some type of delimited list (me@me.com;you@me.com;otherguy@me.com) and pass it through a compose with a split function. This will create an array of email addresses that you can then setup an apply to each loop, and send individual approvals. Within the apply to each you'll want to max out the parallelism, so that all the approvals go out at the same time. Then when each approval is completed, it should log to sharepoint, even if the 10th person in the list responds before the first person, because of the parallelism it should track each approval individually.

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TheJayB 47 on at

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Wowser... I need to get better at this. Slightly in over my head me thinks. I will go through what happens in my flow... im sure I can work out where to put in this step. Just a simple single column currently.

Flow is manually run after youve selected any file in your doc library. That pops up a side box and asks you to put in the approvers manually (i might automate this at some stage.. but let me get this working first lol). Put in 3 approvers. Click send. Then I have a compose step with Inputs set to ID. Then Get file properties for ID is Outputs.
On to Start and Wait for an Approval step... Custom and wait for all responses.
Initialize variable-Approvers. Apply to each Approver... Responses. Append to String variable... Approvers
Initialize variable- ResponseStatus. Apply to each Approver... Responses. Append to String variable... ResponseStatus
Apply to each... Responses. Update file Properties... ID, Approvers, ResponseStatus, Responses Response Date.

2 things im struggling with... is the initial update to the Sharepoint list to update... we've sent a request to 3 people with a status of Pending as soon as you send the request. And then where to put in the fix for the same to happen when someone Approves or Rejects... im definitely missing some steps lol. Ill keep on with the videos.. something will click 🙂 Thanks for your help so far

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AWorley 414 Super User 2024 Season 1 on at

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Hi!
If you output the "Response Approvers Response" to a Condition action then set the argument to the response string you should be able to do IF handling on that approval.

I.E.
Condition: Approver response = Approve
IF YES: DO THIS
IF NO: DO THAT.

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