With GAT Flow, a Google Workspace Admin creating the workflow can use a relative time frame in the conditional workflow.
The time-enforcement operators available are as follows:
- in the last X days
- in the next X days
Create Workflow #
Navigate to Flow → Create workflow (1)
In the Workflow fill in the details. You can set it up also as an Event workflow or Recurring workflow.
- Name – enter the name of the workflow (2)
- Description – enter a description for the workflow (optional)
- Type – select what workflow type you would like to run
- Modify – modify existing users (3)
- Include suspended users – enable or disable to allow you to select users who are currently suspended:
- If enabled – you will be able to select even users who are suspended
- If disabled – you will be able to select only users who are active
- Run immediately after approval – provides an option to schedule the workflow to run in a selected future time (optional)
Later click Next (4) to proceed.
Search for a User #
Search for the users and add them
- Search for a user – click and search for individual users
- Search for a group – click and search for a group of users
- Search for an OU – click and search for the OU of users
- Search for a classroom – click and search for a classroom of users
- Next – click to proceed further
Choose actions #
In the Choose actions click on the (+) button (1) and then click the Add Condition button (2)
You can then click the (+) (1) button beside the ‘Yes’ path of the condition and click Add action (2) to send an email.
From the add action options, you can select what actions you would like to take place. For this example, we will use the ‘Send email’ (1) action.
Double click on the Conditional node (1) to display the available Conditions.
Select the time-based condition such as “Employee start date” or any other time-based pre-defined custom attribute to be able to use one of the time-enforcement operators: in the last X days OR in the next X days.
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In the last X days operator #
You can trigger the workflow to run if the condition set up has happened within the LAST X days.
This allows you to set up past conditions that occurred on your domain a certain number of days ago.
Use case scenario #
A use-case scenario that you can look at can be perhaps a custom attribute “Employee start date”.
This attribute can be used in the conditional workflow as shown below:
In the above example, if the condition is met and there is an employee who started within the last week (last 7 days), the action set in the workflow will be executed (email will be sent as configured in the workflow above).
This configuration allows triggering actions based on the conditions from the past.
If no employee started work in the last week, no action will be triggered as per the workflow above.
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In the next X days operator #
You can trigger the workflow to run if the condition set up will happen within the NEXT X days.
This allows for determining future conditions that will occur in your domain in a certain number of days.
Use case scenario #
The below scenario will trigger the job set in the workflow a specified number of days before an employee’s start date.
In the above example, if the condition is met and there is an employee who will start within the next week (within 7 days), the action set in the workflow will be executed (email will be sent as configured in the workflow above).
This configuration allows triggering actions based on the conditions from the future.
Note: A user needs to be onboarded before setting up the actions based on future conditions. A user’s data needs to be available, such as the user’s name, email address, and start date.
In case there is no employee whose started date is coming in the next week, there would be no action triggered as indicated in the above screenshot.
Send Approval Request #
For security reasons, each workflow needs to be verified by Security Officer.
Once approved by Security Officer, the tasks will run if the conditions specified in the workflow are met.
