Automation - need a required for meeting reminder

Daniel Gill 97 · 11/04/21

Hi all,

I currently have created a form to which PMs submit their project to discuss on a weekly call for authorisation.

I want to incorporate a 'Required Members' reminder for the likes of VPs and stakeholders which they then reply to if they can make the cal.

I have made a required members tab, with multiple contacts in one cell to send the email to those needed.

How can i ensure only one email is sent to those members, and not an email per line item for PM submissions?

I want to include the submissions on the email which i have done by creating a when date is reached trigger and a not in the past condition. however this does not stop the email being sent however many times we have a submission that week (sometimes 14).

i suppose i could putt the contacts on one line and not the rest therefore they are only getting one reminder, but that then only shows them the one submission that week.

In summary, i need a list between a weeks date range to be sent to contacts weekly.

Any help would be appreciated,

Thanks, Dan

Genevieve P. · 11/05/21

I see! Yes, you're correct - the Contact Column part of the workflow evaluates each row separately, so it wouldn't be able to identify that you want Genevieve's row to also send to Daniel unless we were both in the same cell.

Either you can send individual rows out per-person based on who is in the Contact Column or you can send out all rows that meet the criteria to a static list. There currently isn't a way to send a batched group of rows out to contacts selected individually.

Genevieve P. · 11/05/21

Hi @Daniel Gill 97

Instead of having a date-based trigger, I would actually suggest having a "Rows are Added or Changed" trigger, and have the Condition be the date.

This way you can set up the Run Workflow to be Weekly and it will batch together all the rows that meet the criteria into one email! See: Trigger Frequent, Change-Based Automations in Batches

Let me know if this makes sense or if you'd like to see screen captures to explain further.

Cheers,

Genevieve

Daniel Gill 97 · 11/05/21

https://community.smartsheet.com/discussion/comment/310092#Comment_310092

Ah i never even thought of that! Great idea.

Sorry, very new to Smartsheet and i was blind to that option.

Ill give it a go and get back to you ☺️

Genevieve P. · 11/05/21

No problem at all! 🙂

There's lots of little configurations and options, it's easy to miss all the different ways you can set things up. I look forward to hearing if it works for you!

Daniel Gill 97 · 11/05/21

https://community.smartsheet.com/discussion/comment/310096#Comment_310096

Thanks,

I've tried this and i do have the rows together, issue now is how do i send this as a whole to all project managers that submitted that week?

I don't know how we can collate multiple rows of contacts to be sent the same information, is this possible?

Thanks!

Genevieve P. · 11/05/21

Hi @Daniel Gill 97

Your Action Block at the end of the workflow should stay the same... so for example if you have it sent to "Contacts in a Column" then it will only show the relevant, batched rows to the person assigned to each row.

So if you have 3 rows that have both Daniel and Genevieve assigned, and 2 rows with just Daniel assigned, then I would see one email with 3 rows and you would see the same email with 5 rows. Does that make sense?

Daniel Gill 97 · 11/05/21

https://community.smartsheet.com/discussion/comment/310103#Comment_310103

Yes that makes sense however i need it to be all rows.

The reason being is we have a 'running order' in which it describes how the meeting will run:

5/11 Project 1 Daniel

5/11 Project 2 Genevieve

5/11 Project 3 Sam

5/ 11 Project 4 Sam

5/11 Project 5 Sarah

From this, all contacts need to see everyone's project that was submitted on that day, to know when they need to attend the review meeting.

Currently, Sam only receives his, Sarah hers and so on rather than all submitted that week.

Does that make sense? Sorry if I'm being confusing here.

See attached.

Genevieve P. · 11/05/21

Hi @Daniel Gill 97

Thank you for clarifying - in this case you'll want to set the Action to go to Specific People and identify in the workflow itself who should receive the batched reminder. This means it's a static list, so you would always have "Daniel, Genevieve, Sam, Sarah" receiving the weekly email, even if there's nothing they are reviewing that week.

Daniel Gill 97 · 11/05/21

https://community.smartsheet.com/discussion/comment/310111#Comment_310111

Ah ok, see we already copy this list into an email and send to the PMs who summitted that week, we were trying to move away from a small yet manual process.

Due to us having a high amount of PMs, all that don't submit weekly, we would not want the running order going out to those who do not submit that week.

I presume what i am asking for is not possible?

Really appreciate your help so far.

Genevieve P. · 11/05/21

I see! Yes, you're correct - the Contact Column part of the workflow evaluates each row separately, so it wouldn't be able to identify that you want Genevieve's row to also send to Daniel unless we were both in the same cell.

Either you can send individual rows out per-person based on who is in the Contact Column or you can send out all rows that meet the criteria to a static list. There currently isn't a way to send a batched group of rows out to contacts selected individually.

Daniel Gill 97 · 11/05/21

https://community.smartsheet.com/discussion/comment/310117#Comment_310117

Ok thank you, shame!

Not to worry though, thanks for letting me know and working with me! :)

Automation - need a required for meeting reminder

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