MS FLOW to pick approver email id from a list

[mbhushan]

We have implemented an approval Flow in MS Sharepoint. In 'Approval Request action' email id's of approver are configured. However the approvers get changed very frequently so i always need to update email id in Flow. What i want is to create another list where i can configure approver email id's and those email's can be used in MS Flow. so i dont update FLOW every time but only update in list will be enough. Is there any way to achieve it?

Thanks in advance

[Laskewitz]

@mbhushan

You can add the following actions in the approval flow:

• Add an initiate variable action
• Add a get list items (SharePoint) action to get all the approvers in the list with approvers
• Add an apply to each
• In that apply to each for the list items add the approver email to the variable you created before
• Add the variable as the approver

[mbhushan]

Thanks for it. However is there anyway to avoid 'Apply to Each' loop? The issue i have 8 differnt approvers for whom approval request is sent. If we apply to each then it waits untill every approver takes some action. Then only it goes for next step. In our situation, it is not mandatory that all 8 approvers must take action. Any 2-4 approvers can action. 

[mbhushan]

Or Let's think other way. In Approver List i have 8 approver names with differnt roles.

I called Get Items action to get Approver list data. Then Initatilize variable configured to define variable name as Approver. So is there any way i can set Approver value for a specific approver name in list? e.g. When i call 'Set variable' value, i can filter a specific approver name from list and set it to Approver variable? So it does not make mandatory to call for 'Apply to Each' loop.

[Laskewitz]

Hi @mbhushan,

What is your scenario exactly? Do you have different approvers for different departments? In that case you could use OData filters to filter the right approver in the get items action. (check out this excellent blog for more info about that)

- Daniel

[mbhushan]

Hi Daniel,

You are right. I have 8 departments where this approval request is sent. Tried to provide an view of MS Flow snap. If i add Apply to each in every approval then flow becomes very lengthy. I am looking for a simple solution where i can pickup email id from list where i sent approval request to these 8 approvers.