How to send notifications to people assigned to a row entry

Dear @Luis Orosco,

Thank you for reaching out to the Microsoft Q&A Community.

I understand that you want to set up automated notifications to people assigned to a row in your spreadsheet within Microsoft Teams, whether it's an @mention in Teams or an email with the row details. The best way to achieve this is by using Microsoft Power Automate (formerly Microsoft Flow).

 First, you need to prepare a few things:

• File Location: Ensure your Excel spreadsheet is stored in Teams/SharePoint.
• Excel Table: Format your action items as an Excel Table (Insert > Table).
• Owner Column: Include an "Owner" column, preferably with the assigned user's email address or username.

Here's how you can do it:

1.Go to Power Automate:

• Open your web browser and go to flow.microsoft.com.
• Sign in with your Microsoft 365 account.

2.Create a New Flow:

• In the left navigation pane, click Create.
• Select Automated cloud flow.
• Give your flow a name (e.g., "Continuous Improvement Action Item Notification").
• For the trigger, search for "Excel" or "SharePoint" depending on where your file is directly accessed.
  • If it's an Excel file in a Teams Channel's Files tab (which means it's on SharePoint), search for "When a row is added, modified or deleted" for the Excel Online (Business) connector.
  • You'll need to specify the Location (your SharePoint site or OneDrive), Document Library, and the File itself.
  • Crucially, select the Table name within your Excel file.
• If you've linked the data to a dedicated SharePoint List (which is often more robust for structured data like this), the trigger would be "When an item is created" for the SharePoint connector.

3.Add a Condition (Optional but Recommended):

• After the trigger, click + New step.
• Search for "Condition" and add it.
• This is useful if you only want to send a notification when the "owner" column changes or when the status of the item is "Assigned" or "In Progress."
• You can set a condition like: [Owner Column Value] is not empty.

4.Get Row Details (if using Excel Trigger):

• If your trigger is "When a row is added, modified or deleted" in Excel, you'll likely need another step to "Get a row" to retrieve all the column data for the newly added row. You'll use the unique ID from the trigger.

5.Send Notification (Choose one or both):

Option A: Send a Teams Message (@mention)

1. Click + New step.
2. Search for "Teams" and select the action "Post a message in a chat or channel".
3. Choose Post as: Flow bot or User.
4. Choose Post in: Channel or Chat with Flow bot.
   • If Channel: Select your Team and the specific Channel.
   • If Chat with Flow bot: For the Recipient, use the dynamic content from your Excel row that contains the "owner's" email address (e.g., Owner Email from the trigger or "Get a row" action).
   • In the Message box, craft your message. You can use dynamic content to pull in details from the newly added row. To @mention the owner in a Teams channel, you might need a slightly more advanced step to resolve their UPN for the mention, or simply use their name and explain they're assigned. If sending directly to their chat with Flow bot, the mention isn't strictly necessary as it's a direct message.
   • Example message: "A new action item has been assigned to you: [Item Title from Excel]. Description: [Item Description from Excel]. Due Date: [Due Date from Excel]."

Option B: Send an Email

1. Click + New step.
2. Search for "Outlook" and select the action "Send an email (V2)" (for Office 365 Outlook connector).
3. In the To field, use the dynamic content for the "owner's" email address from your Excel row.
4. Fill in the Subject and Body using dynamic content from your Excel row to include all relevant details.

• Example Subject: "New Action Item Assigned: [Item Title]"
  • Example Body: "Hello [Owner Name], A new continuous improvement action item has been assigned to you: Item: [Item Title] Description: [Item Description] Due Date: [Due Date] Link to Spreadsheet: [Link to your Teams spreadsheet] Please review and take action. Thank you!"

6.Save and Test:

• Save your flow.
• Test it by adding a new row to your spreadsheet in Teams. Power Automate should then trigger the notification.

Considerations:

• Permissions: Ensure the flow's creator (or service account) has proper access to the Excel file and can send Teams messages/emails.
• Avoid Duplicates: For "When a row is added, modified or deleted" trigger, add a condition to only send if a "Notification Sent" column is blank, then update that column after sending.
• SharePoint Lists: For more robust action tracking and built-in integration, consider using a SharePoint List within Teams instead of Excel.

I hope this information is helpful. Please feel free to reach out if you have any further questions or require additional assistance.

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