Access Request for Smartsheet

Sherry Fox

When a user requests access to a sheet (or workspace), is it possible to REQUIRE them to provide a reason they want/need access? We receive requests from some users we do not even know. While there are new hires that would need access having the ability to have them define their reason would be preferred. And if so, how do I go about putting this into place?

Kelly Moore

Hey @Sherry Fox

The community may have other solutions but I literally just worked a problem involving Access requests for one of my collaborators. It's a work-around, but it worked for us.

Since the trigger is the Outlook email that arrives, I leveraged Microsoft's Power Automate "PA" to strip the email address out of the Request Access subject line (we have Outlook365). You could add to the PA flow to then send a link to a smartsheet form for the user to complete or just send an email to the requester. If your flow used a smartsheet form your smartsheet process could trigger an automated approval process, if you chose to. If you have access to Bridge, you can further automate using Bridge to ultimately share the sheet. (My solution had PA send a row to a smartsheet then used Bridge add the user as a new member to a smartsheet group. However, our problem was simpler, if anyone requested access they received access so no approval step was involved).

If you're interested, here's the Power Automate cloud flow that strips out the user email address from the Request Access email. Even if you just want an email back from the user explaining, you could do that since the output of the Compose step is the email address. The arrows show the parameters that are inside the process boxes

Here's the function in the Compose: last(split(variables('Subject-String'),'for ')) This gets the email address

Your final steps could look something like this. I would add a 60sec delay then delete the Request Access email to make the flow ultimately 'hands free'.

Kelly

Humashankar

Hi @Sherry Fox

Yes, it is possible to require users to provide a reason when requesting access to a workspace

The below URL will help you the process -

-> Allow public to request access | Smartsheet Learning Center

​​​​​​​-> Request access to an item | Smartsheet Learning Center

Hope this helps - Happy to help further!!

Thank you very much and have a great one!

Warm regards

Kelly Moore

Hey @Sherry Fox

The community may have other solutions but I literally just worked a problem involving Access requests for one of my collaborators. It's a work-around, but it worked for us.

Since the trigger is the Outlook email that arrives, I leveraged Microsoft's Power Automate "PA" to strip the email address out of the Request Access subject line (we have Outlook365). You could add to the PA flow to then send a link to a smartsheet form for the user to complete or just send an email to the requester. If your flow used a smartsheet form your smartsheet process could trigger an automated approval process, if you chose to. If you have access to Bridge, you can further automate using Bridge to ultimately share the sheet. (My solution had PA send a row to a smartsheet then used Bridge add the user as a new member to a smartsheet group. However, our problem was simpler, if anyone requested access they received access so no approval step was involved).

If you're interested, here's the Power Automate cloud flow that strips out the user email address from the Request Access email. Even if you just want an email back from the user explaining, you could do that since the output of the Compose step is the email address. The arrows show the parameters that are inside the process boxes

Here's the function in the Compose: last(split(variables('Subject-String'),'for ')) This gets the email address

Your final steps could look something like this. I would add a 60sec delay then delete the Request Access email to make the flow ultimately 'hands free'.

Kelly

Sherry Fox

@Kelly Moore

I was hoping for a simplified answer, although that is a great Plan B. I did just make a suggestion for Feedback & Ideas. https://community.smartsheet.com/discussion/119664/

Kelly Moore

@Sherry Fox

Yep, I also wished there was a simpler answer and the workaround wasn't needed. I'll vote up your suggestion.

Kelly