Workflow to Populate Actual Start Date When %Complete changes from 0 or blank

Summer M

Hello!

I currently have the following workflow set in my smartsheet:

What I'm trying to achieve is to record an actual start date on the first date any % complete is recorded for a row and then I have a second workflow that is set to mark an Actual Finish date and lock the row when % complete reaches 100%. I'm having an issue right now, though, where my actual start date is getting overridden when %s in % complete column are changing at all (which makes sense based on this workflow) - but I can't figure out how to make this a one time action. As in, I want my sheet to populate the actual start ONLY when the % complete changes FROM BLANK or FROM ZERO to any value, and then not change again.

Is there a way to make my workflow more specific like this?

Mark.poole

Add a condition where Actual start date is blank.

Vince Darrigo

Hi @Summer M

You could add a checkbox column to your sheet (and hide it if you don't want to see it) let's call it New Checkbox

Then in the workflow you posted, in conditions add 2 of them:

"New Checkbox is not checked"

"% Complete is greater than 0"

Then, change your action from Record Date, to Change Cell Value, and choose to check New Checkbox.

From there, create a new workflow that says when rows are changed and New Checkbox changes to Checked, Record Date in Actual Start.

This way, the automation can only happen one time each time the record's percent complete goes above 0%. Annoying that you cannot update the checkbox and record the date in the same workflow, but that's because Smartsheet considers each of those actions to be workflow terminating actions. I daisy chain things like this to get around that. I hope this helps!

Summer M

Thank you all for the input! I have adjusted the condition a few ways and am still seeing a lot of weird results….I have the following 4 workflows set:

Two for populating Actual Start:

And two for populating Actual Finish/locking complete rows:

I set these workflows and tested a few scenarios and they seemed to be working great, but after exiting the sheet and returning the next morning, I see this:

Every row is locked and has an actual finish date, and even down lower in the plan, all the actual start dates were filled with the same dates.

I should note, more than once I've tested the workflow and it seems to work perfectly after a quick save and refresh, but once the sheet has sat overnight I open it again and find this!

You guys have already been so helpful - thank you!