How to automate approval workflows in Power Automate

Approvals are the quiet productivity killer. A purchase needs a manager's sign-off, so someone emails them. The email gets buried. Three days later the supplier chases, someone forwards it again, and eventually a reply lands in a thread no one can find. Multiply that across purchase orders, holiday requests, timesheets and document sign-offs, and a surprising amount of your week disappears into chasing.

Power Automate fixes this properly. Below is how an approval flow actually works, and how to build one that routes, reminds and records itself.

What an automated approval flow does

Instead of an email chain, the flow gives you a single, trackable process:

• Triggers automatically — when a form is submitted, a file is added to SharePoint, or an item is created in a list.
• Routes to the right approver — based on amount, department or whoever owns that area.
• Sends a one-click Approve / Reject — straight to their email or Microsoft Teams, no app to open.
• Chases for you — automatic reminders if no response after, say, two days.
• Records the decision — who approved what, and when, written back to your list as an audit trail.

The goal isn't a faster email. It's removing the email entirely.

The building blocks

1. The trigger

Start with where the request comes from. A Microsoft Form, a SharePoint list item, or a Power App. Power Automate listens for that event and starts the flow — no one has to remember to kick it off.

2. The "Start and wait for an approval" action

This is the heart of it. You set the approver(s), the title, and the details they need to decide. Power Automate emails them (and posts in Teams) with Approve and Reject buttons. The flow then pauses until they respond.

3. The condition

Once a decision comes back, a simple condition branches the flow: on Approve, notify the requester and update the record; on Reject, send the reason back. You can add tiers here too — for example, anything over £5,000 also needs a director.

4. The reminder loop

Add a parallel branch that waits a couple of days and, if there's still no decision, nudges the approver. This single step is what ends the chasing.

A real-world example

Take purchase orders for a small contractor. A site manager submits a form; the flow checks the value; anything under £1,000 goes to the commercial lead, anything above also routes to a director; reminders fire after 48 hours; and every decision is logged in a SharePoint list that doubles as a live PO register. What used to be a fortnight of back-and-forth becomes same-day, with a clean record for the auditors.

Watch-outs

• Licensing — basic approvals run on standard Microsoft 365 plans; advanced connectors may need a premium licence. Check before you build.
• Keep approvers human-light — don't route everything to one person, or you've just moved the bottleneck.
• Plan the "reject" path — rejections need a clear route back, or requests vanish.

The takeaway

If your team spends real time emailing for sign-offs, an approval flow is one of the highest-return automations you can build — usually live within a week, and it pays for itself in reclaimed hours and a clean audit trail.