Approval Request Workflows - Record Approver

Glenn Garrison · 11/30/21

I have an Request Approval workflow on a sheet to request approval for a Credit Memo.

The requestor uses a Smartsheet form to submit the request, the workflow is triggered by the row being added and what type of action caused the need for a request.

Either of two team members can approve the Credit Memo.

The workflow is working fine, but I am trying to figure out how to capture and record the actual approver of the request. Either their name or email.

Any suggestions are appreciated.

Glenn

Genevieve P. · 12/01/21

Hi @Glenn Garrison

The way I would do this is to set up a System Modified By column in your sheet which will identify the email address of the user who modified the row (ex. by clicking "Approve" from the Approval email).

The Modified column will adjust as soon as any modifications are made to the cell, so I would then set up another Contact Column to house the Approver Contact in a static way, using the "Assign People" workflow, like so:

Screen Shot 2021-12-01 at 12.56.07 PM.png

This workflow will only trigger based on the Approve or Decline from the Approval workflow, and it uses Condition Blocks to check the Modified By column for the correct each for each contact. Does that make sense?

Cheers,

Genevieve

Glenn Garrison · 12/01/21

Thank you I will give this approach a try.

Glenn

mrigau · 06/23/22

This works great. How we can do the same for the date and time it was approved?

Genevieve P. · 06/23/22

Hi @mrigau

You can use a Record a Date action in your workflow to add a date to a Date type of column based on a trigger, see: Set the current date with the Record a Date action

Smartsheet does not currently have a time column or timestamp function. Please submit your feature request to the Product team by creating an Idea Post in the Smartsheet Product Feedback and Ideas topic here in the Community. This will allow other users to vote on your enhancement idea!

Thanks,

Genevieve

Andrée Starå · 06/23/22

Hi @mrigau

I hope you're well and safe!

To add to Genevieve's excellent advice/answer.

Please have a look at my post below with a method I developed.

More info:

https://community.smartsheet.com/discussion/68589/lock-or-store-date-value-solution-without-using-zapier

Would that work/help?

I hope that helps!

Be safe and have a fantastic week!

Best,

Andrée Starå | Workflow Consultant / CEO @ WORK BOLD

✅Did my post(s) help or answer your question or solve your problem? Please support the Community by marking it Insightful/Vote Up, Awesome, or/and as the accepted answer. It will make it easier for others to find a solution or help to answer!

mrigau · 06/23/22

Thanks @Genevieve P.

This will work. It does forces the workflow to end with this. After the form is approved, I need to record the time and who approved it. Is there any way to include both actions in the same workflow?

Assign people to a field and Record a date?

Genevieve P. · 06/24/22

Hi @mrigau

Assign People and Record a Date are both terminal actions, which means that no, you cannot have both actions in the same workflow. You'll need to build two workflows to get both the date and the user.

mrigau · 06/24/22

The challenge is that I need to update the fields for approver and date and follow that with a generated document with fields mapped to a report. When I generate the Assign People, Record a Date and generate document in parallel workflows, it creates the document first without the updates of the fields of people and date. Any suggestions?

Genevieve P. · 06/24/22

Hi @mrigau

What is the trigger for your Generate Document workflow? Could you set it up to be triggered by when the Record a Date cell is filled?

mrigau · 06/24/22

Let me try that and see if it works. Thanks

Approval Request Workflows - Record Approver

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