How can i get the name of the person who approved a request from a user group?


Badge +4

Let say i have a task assigned to a group of people by using the "Start a task process", inside the user group have 3 people (e.g. User A, B, C), the task will be completed once one of the user approved or rejected from the user group.

 

Finally i need send an email to the initiator who approved or rejected the request from the user group. (User A or B or C)

 

How can i do it in o365 workflow? thanks.


15 replies

Badge +4

Hi,

on "start a task process" action, you have a new parameter named "Task IDs"

It allow you to define a variable (collection type) in wich Nintex will store ID of all task generated

After you juste have to loop on it and do your job

Badge +11

Even though a person is assigned a task as a group member, they fill out the form as an individual, and therefore their name can be saved to a workflow variable. You would have to make sure that you set the Assignment Behaviour to 'Assign a Task to each member within groups'.

In my example I am collecting both approver name, outcome and comments:

https://community.nintex.com/docs/DOC-6372-how-to-collect-multiple-approver-comments-and-decisions-from-one-365-nintex-workflow-approval-task

Badge +4

How come the value of "Modify By" is showing "SharePoint APP" in my workflows task list? 

Badge +4

How come the value of "Modify By" is showing "SharePoint APP" in my workflows task list?

Badge +9

Hi Joe,

SharePoint App will be showing because the task was completed via a Nintex method such as Lazy Approval or Actionable Message perhaps, because we take the action on behalf of a user it shows as SharePoint App (because we can't impersonate a user arbitrarily).

Thanks,


Callum

Badge +11

As mentioned by Callum, if the assigned task is completed by email approval, the modified by is set to SharePoint App. If this task was assigned to an individual, you can deduce that the approving person is the assignee - email approval only works from the assigned account.

We probably cannot deduce this if it is assigned to a group. For that, you may need to assign approvals individually, or force approvers to use the form; and not approve through email.

Badge +4

Dear Callum,

So how can I get the user name who approved the task?

Best Regards,

Joe Lau

Systems Analyst

IMAGINEX GROUP

30/F, One Island South,

2 Heung Yip Road, Wong Chuk Hang, Hong Kong.

T:(852) 3102 3712 F:(852) 3101 5856

www.imaginex.com.hk<http://www.imaginex.com.hk/>

Badge +9

Right now it would be the Assigned To user, when we update a task via LazyApproval or Actionable Message, we check to make sure that the identity of the approver matches what is in the task, to cater for situations like escalations. If the user doesn't match then we won't process the outcome.

Callum

Badge +4

Dear Callum,

I don’t understand why I can get the Assignee name (Task Properties --> Assignee) and paste into the approver’s email, but cannot record the name of assignee to Workflow task list?

Best Regards,

Joe Lau

Systems Analyst

IMAGINEX GROUP

30/F, One Island South,

2 Heung Yip Road, Wong Chuk Hang, Hong Kong.

T:(852) 3102 3712 F:(852) 3101 5856

www.imaginex.com.hk<http://www.imaginex.com.hk/>

Badge +9

That's correct, though if you need to see exactly who completed a task you may want to look at the Start a Task Process, which handles multiple task allocations, you can then assign a task to a group of users, and set it so that the first responder completes the process (same as Assign a Task behaviour). The advantage of this is that you can then see the exact task and assignee that completed the process.

Badge +9

Hi Joe,

Do you mean after the task is completed? You should be able to by using a List Lookup in a Set Workflow Variable. We output the Task ID so you can go and pull any field you want from there.

We're actually just looking at the comments/retrieval process here for these actions, if you have any suggestions or use cases you can share with me here or via DM, that would help us.

Thanks,


Callum

Badge +4

But if I use “Start a task process” and set it to first responder completes the process, the “Modify by” in workflow list is showing “SharePoint App”, how can I get the name of approver exactly?

Best Regards,

Joe Lau

Systems Analyst

IMAGINEX GROUP

30/F, One Island South,

2 Heung Yip Road, Wong Chuk Hang, Hong Kong.

T:(852) 3102 3712 F:(852) 3101 5856

www.imaginex.com.hk<http://www.imaginex.com.hk/>

Badge +9

In the Start a Task model, if you assign it to a group of three people, three tasks will be created, one assigned to each person. So the task that is completed and returned from the task action will be the one assigned to the person that completed the task (the other two tasks assigned to the other two respective individuals would be deleted).

This differs from assign a task which has a single task assigned to the group identity, then there is no way to know which member of the group completed it (it is not relevant in the Assign a Task model).

Hope that helps

Callum

Badge +4

So.. I may need to disable the lazy approval for a group of approver, force them to use the Task:URL link, anyway thanks for your help ~~

Best Regards,

Joe Lau

Systems Analyst

IMAGINEX GROUP

30/F, One Island South,

2 Heung Yip Road, Wong Chuk Hang, Hong Kong.

T:(852) 3102 3712 F:(852) 3101 5856

www.imaginex.com.hk<http://www.imaginex.com.hk/>

Badge +11

Yes, when assigning to an individual, approval by lazy approval, where nothing is saved from the form => we know who the approver is because it can only be one person. But in the case of a group assignment, we can only really get the individual information from variables saved out from the form.

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