How to build Power Automate Approval Workflows for SharePoint | Step by Step Tutorial

Step by Step Power Automate Approval tutorial video that covers how to build Approval flows for SharePoint lists, dynamically define flow approvers, keep track of Approval History, set item level permissions for SharePoint List Item & provide users the ability to re-submit (re-trigger) the approval process.
Keeping Item Permissions in mind when Building Power Automate Approval Workflows with SharePoint is Key!
Scenario in video is an Expense Report application in SharePoint where users log expense details & we have a Power Automate Approval Process that secures the SharePoint item under approval (read-only) while the approval process is on-going.
The approval technique showcased in video also works with SharePoint Document Libraries.

Topics covered with example:
✔️ Get started with Building Power Automate Approval Flows
✔️ Dynamic approvers selection for flow approvals
✔️ Flow Approval Status Indicator
✔️ Flow Approval History Logging & Tracking
✔️ Flow Approval + SharePoint Security
✔️ Re-trigger Approval Workflow

🔗 Expressions used in Video:

#PowerAutomate #Approvals #SharePoint #flow #PowerPlatform

Table of Contents:
00:00 - Introduction to building Power Automate approval flows with SharePoint Lists (item permissions)
00:50 - Setting up SharePoint List for Power Automate Approvals
02:07 - Step-by-Step tutorial to build approval workflows in Power Automate
03:51 - Set Assigned To for start and wait for an approval action dynamically
05:23 - Check approval outcome and perform SharePoint list update item for Status column
06:40 - Log flow approval history information to SharePoint Multi Lines of Text (Rich Text) column
09:01 - Testing the Power Automate approval workflow
09:32 - Power Automate SharePoint approvals - what about security?
11:04 - Build Power Automate approval workflow with item permissions for SharePoint List
15:33 - Restart the Power Automate Approval workflow on item modified in SharePoint List
21:50 - Subscribe to Reza Dorrani channel

🤝 Let’s connect on social:

[felipebayona]

Geez, I can't believe actually I was searching for this exact topic for a project earlier. How can this coincidence happen? 😲

[kiwbxdj]

Best Content Ever, Paid Courses will not cover your topics, you are genius

[AdiCristea]

Had to review the last part in order to get my head around the Creator Email must be equal to Modifier Email condition, very clever, thanks, Reza!

[skjones]

For our old on-prem workflows we used AD groups to get approvers. Now moving to SharePoint lists, since this is so much easier. Thank you for the video! Good stuff!

[ArohShukla]

What an incredible video with so many golden nuggets that I could use for my own projects. The Security section was one of the best sections that nobody talks about, and you covered so beautifully step be step Reza.

Thanks again for sharing, brother.

[bobbelter]

Great video! I would love to see some videos on Document Set Approvals. Nobody on the Internet is doing justice to that topic. I would like to have an approval (manual or automated) that approves all documents in a document set at once, instead of individually approving the documents.

[rharoalverde]

This is better than my solution to create a new view and filter by name or approver. It removes the need for the owners to change the view to see all. I will try it tomorrow. Thanks!

[thebreaksmusicshow]

Again, Exactly what I need in creating a 13 step Governance Approval flow. I probably need to put you down as a co-creator of my app at this point.

[danialkhan]

Excellent video. you depicts the actual scenarios, covered each aspect of approval cycle which is very informative . use variety of actions and triggers . superb hats off.

[ivqtlcu]

Post watching your videos feels like, its so simple. Awesome way of explaining so complex things and make them fun for all of us. :)

[yehunlavolontededieu]

Hi Reza, I am here today to wish you and your family a happy wonderful holiday on behalf of the 60k Reza nation. And I'm proud to say I am a fam since the beginning, There were only 13 subscribers when I joined, And I knew your potential, where you'd be heading and I said hmm 100k sub isn't far he got a good deal 😊and now look at you it's happening . We are growing together You go bro, You have helped us a lot I owe you a good Pumpkin Pie but you're far🥧. May God grant you a bright and happy beginning in the new year.

[smvnizo]

Hi Reza,
Thanks for the helpful videos. I changed this solution a little bit for my scenario, the trigger is “when an item or file is modified”, trigger conditions are 1) approval status is “Rejected” and “modified by email = Requester email”., I am not sure why it doesn't consistently trigger despite meeting these conditions during tests.

In general, I mixed up the points from different videos to cover my scenario, my setup consisting of three flows. Flow 1 receives CER requests from MS Forms and transfers the data and attachments to a SharePoint List. Flow 2 handles approvals based on the department selected in the form and can involve 0 to 4 approvers, sending it for hierarchical approval. If the decision is 'Rejected, ' it allows the form submitter to modify and restart the approval process. To handle Rejected items, I've set up Flow 3 with trigger conditions 'when an item or file is modified' and conditions 'approval status is 'Rejected' and 'modified by email = Requester email.' the trigger of Flow 3 doesn't work consistently.

Can anyone offer insights or suggestions to resolve this issue?

[gitaiganor]

Great video, no new stuff but it organises the issue nicely.
I alway look at the last 5 min of the Video for the advanced part -
May I ask:
I know you have many new followers.. but, still,
please do not forget those who follow you carefully in the last 3 years and remember all your previous videos and expecting to get up with you to higher advanced levels.❤

[chapish]

Very clever stuff, Reza.

It makes me wonder how you would document a complex flow like this so that it can be supported by others in an organisation. In fact a video on how to document complex flows and/or Power Apps would be very useful.

[bobbirowlett]

Reza - this is great information! You have expanded my knowledge for a project that I didn't know how I would handle it. This helps so much! Thanks again!!!

[sweedish]

I'm convinced that you are a Microsoft AI creating these insane workflows (on other topics as well) helping others to actually utilise tools from the Microsoft Stack. Anyway: thank you!

[MrNavedsk]

been struggling for 4 days with that infinite loop. thank you again reza sir

[GoWstingray]

Great video as usual Rezza! Might nick your idea of adding the approval info to the item using the html table! haha.
Another thing i have added to a couple of my approval Flows so far, is to handle the Cancel button in Teams Approvals, for me when it is clicked the Approval will continue without an Outcome.
I test for this in a condition, notify the Approvers and do the same as rejected, giving edit permissions back so the request can be resubmitted. Very handy if a user has made a mistake and want to correct it without asking the approver to Reject, and stops them bothering me.

Thanks

[ypvcbvq]

Thank you, your concepts of avoiding loop actions and nesting expressions has made my use case a lot more feasible for my organization!

[georgegualda]

Reza, we are building a product configurator and your video will definitely help us in the process. Thanks for the excellent video as always.