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mmorales
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Flow - Start and Wait for an Approval - Multiple Approvers - Keep receiving "Start an approval action failed"

Hi everyone, I'm trying to set up an automated approval workflow that would sometimes require multiple approvers. The end goal is that everyone should answer before the flow moves forward but I seem to be having trouble getting that set up correctly. I can not for the life of me see what I have wrong. Hoping someone can help please.

 

Below is a screenshot of the of my flow that I keep having issues with. 

I receive the initial approval email to both assigned email addresses, after hitting approval on both user accounts it immediately goes to an approval failed action.

Should the Outcome - is equal to - be 'Approve' only in this scenario with multiple assigned users?

Flow_Multiple_Approvers_Screenshot.jpg

 

 

14 REPLIES 14
Jcook
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Hello,

You will want to use the dynamic content Responses in your IF condition.

For your reference:
Outcome is for 1 Approval response.
Responses is an array of all Outcomes

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Hi Josh, 

Thank you for response, I  just changed my condition to "Responses - All of the Responses - is equal to Approve" but I still got an immediate "Start an Approval Action Failed" after all approvers responded. 

***edit***
I clicked post too soon hehe, 

I'm not sure if this is necessary but do I need to collect the responses somewhere?
I don't see any other options under Start and wait for an approval.  

Pstork1
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Let me clarify @Jcook response a bit.  Responses is a collection of all the individual responses to the approval. Outcome is a single summary of all those responses as a string. If there is only one approver it will be either Approve or Reject.  If there is more than one approver it will be a space seperated concatenation of their responses.  So for two approvers who both Approve it would be "Approve Approve".  For three it would be "Approve Approve Approve" and so on. @Jcook is correct.  The way you have it coded it should be Responses, not Outcome.



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Hi @Pstork1 I just tried what you recommended of Responses - is equal to - Approve Approve 

but I received another Start an Approval action Failed.

 

Just to confirm, I should be selecting the "Responses - All of the Responses" correct?
Flow_Multiple_Approvers_Responses.jpg

 

Pstork1
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My point was that if you used Outcome you don't need the Apply to Each loop.  You only need the condition to test Outcome.  If you are going to use the loop on Responses then you want to test the 'Response' dynamic content.



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@Pstork1 Gotcha gotcha, 

So as I understand it, you are saying for me to test it out as shown below in the image?
Flow_Multiple_Approvers_Responses2.jpg

 

Pstork1
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Not quite.  If you are going to use a loop based on Responses then there should be a piece of dynamic data available when doing your condition that ends in Response (note the singular ending).  That's what your condition should be based on.  And you should be checking against Approve.  "Approve Approve" would be if you were checking Outcome outside the loop.



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@Pstork1  I eventually could not get having 2 different approvers in the same "Start and Wait for an Approval - Everyone Must Approve" to work. It would either reject the response of Approve, Approve or if I changed the condition from "Response" to "Outcome" it would send a Approve / Reject email to the created by email that initially kicked off the flow.
I ending up opting to do this in a two step method where it would go to the 1st user for approval and if he approved it would then go to the 2nd user. In both scenarios they each have a condition to inform the "Creator" in the event if something was rejected. 

I've attached two screenshots below in the event if anyone ever runs into the same scenario. 

First ApproverFirst Approver

 

Second ApproverSecond Approver

 

 

 

Hi @Pstork1@Jcook

 

I'm having a similar challenge and wonder if you could please help?

 

We've got three levels of sequential approvals and the first approval step (#1) requires both approvers (always two) to approve. Then there is a condition if they approve it goes to approver #2, if they approve to approver #3 and then the final outcome.

 

At the moment, it goes to approver stage #1 and then flows to #2 and #3, and completes the outcome, but then cycles back to approver #2 and #3 for a second time.

 

I've posted a screengrab of how it's setup.Screen Shot 2021-03-24 at 9.51.22 am.png

Pstork1
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Outcome is a delimited string of the approvals.  So if you have two approvers it will look like "Approve, Approve" or "Reject, Approve".  I normally turn the conditions around and check if Outcome "Contains" "Reject".  If it does its rejected.  If it doesn't its Approved.  Since you are only checking for Approve its giving you some false positives.



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Pstork1
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@Jcook Outcome will actually work for multiple approvers.  It gives you a comma delimited string of the results.  That way you can evaluate the result without resorting to an Apply to Each.



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Thanks @Pstork1, I've re-built the flow and having some good success using your suggested method with testing in prototype. Will confirm asap how it goes in final version. Really appreciate your help.

Hi @Pstork1, confirming all good here. Thanks again for your help! 

Thank you so much.  This worked for me.  Saved my bacon!

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