How to Create & Update Planner Tasks from Excel (or Teams)

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Learn how to seamlessly integrate Microsoft Excel with Planner using Power Automate! This tutorial guides you through creating a flow that turns Excel rows into individual tasks in Planner, all with a simple click.
🔍 What's Inside:
▪️ Integration of Excel and Planner: Discover how to connect Excel with Planner for efficient task management.
▪️ Step-by-Step Flow Creation: Walk through the process of setting up an instant cloud flow in Power Automate, including selecting rows in Excel and creating corresponding tasks in Planner.
▪️ Customizable Task Fields: Learn how to include additional details like due dates and bucket selection in the flow, making your tasks more specific and organized.
▪️ User-Friendly Approach: No coding required! The process is straightforward and designed for easy implementation.
▪️ Testing and Execution: See how the flow works in real-time, both in Excel Online and within Microsoft Teams.
In addition I'll show you how to create and use variables in Power Automate so that you allow the user to add additional information to the task when they start the flow including a selection from a drop down field. This way you can have the user select the bucket they'd like to add the task to and your flow will transform the bucket name to the bucket ID and add the tasks to the selected bucket This way you learn how to work with variables in power automate.
We'll also run the Power Automate flow directly from Microsoft Teams.
00:00 Automatically Create Planner Tasks from Excel with a Flow
01:51 Setup Instant Cloud Flow in Power Automate
05:22 Update Task Details for the Task Description
06:28 Run Power Automate Flow From Microsoft Excel
08:04 Run Power Automate Flow From Microsoft Teams
09:27 Allow User To Select Bucket in Planner From Drop Down List
11:33 Use Apply to Each in Power Automate
12:12 Set Variables in Power Automate
13:50 Test the final flow
14:34 Wrap Up
More Power Automate tutorials: • Power Automate | Flow ...
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#excel #microsoftplanner #powerautomate

[@LeilaGharani]

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[@daveswanson1951]

This is Great! Just 3 hours ago, I showed my boss and peers how I use Planner in Teams to track and monitor tasks I've assigned to my direct reports. Those tasks come from a spreadsheet I maintain separately to collect project improvement ideas and manually add to Planner when we start working the projects. They were impressed with my process - wait until I share this video with them! Thanks!

[@LeilaGharani]

That's perfect, Dave! Glad it was helpful for you.

[@chh8860]

Whew! ... at my level of expertise this feature is like getting a drink of water with a firehose. Halfway through Leila's presentation I was (once again) marveling at the ease she moves about the screen, clicking options I never knew existed ... when it suddenly hit me her talent is like watching an Olympic figure skater effortlessly gliding about the ice ... powerfully jumping ... a triple 'something' ... landing gracefully ... and then quickly off to another imaginative maneuver while I am still thinking about the last powerful jump ... twist ... and loop that I just saw ... and another ... and another ... and ... another. George Bernard Shaw once said "Man learns to skate by staggering about making a fool of himself. Indeed he progresses at all things by resolutely making a fool of himself". I resolutely watch Leila in the hope of one day learning to skate ... but some days I realize I have a loooong way to go. Today was one of those days ... but my god she is fun to watch even if I will never be in the Olympics.

[@vijayarjunwadkar]

Apt description, it was sort of a whirlwind and rollercoaster combined! 😁

[@adamknight5089]

Agreed, nice to see experts in action, for me to actually do this myself, I'd be pausing and unpausing the video many times while copying everything

[@LeilaGharani]

Thank you so much 😊. That's really kind! If you see the behind the scenes though, you'll find a more clumsy skater. It's just that all the falls were cut out and only the highlights were officially broadcasted :)

[@chanthyleang5337]

@@adamknight5089 Indeed, I paused almost the whole morning now and I am still stuck at the "Table" section where it only showed "no item" or "enter custom value". But I really love Leila's videos.

[@mariasaba8091]

This is so helpful especially when managing a team. I've been trying to find ways to automate certain tasks. These videos also help you think in different ways to improve your processes. Thank you you are awesome 🤩

[@LeilaGharani]

You're so welcome, Maria!

[@limbertodelgado23]

Nunca es tarde para aprender,más si hay una persona que,nos enseña, sin cuestionar nuestra ignorancia. Gracias por hacernos partícipes de su conocimiento.

[@bryanpepe2395]

Great video! Thanks!

[@ChristopherYellen]

This is so helpful! I followed it step by step - so simple and you explained every detail! I'm hoping to be able to add checklist items to Planner from Excel as well - that's my next challenge! Thanks from a new subscriber!

[@cenzodivine1]

Excellent video. You are a life saver!

[@michaeldavis9954]

Excellent video. It had just the right presentational tone, was very pedagogical and helped me a lot. Thanks!

[@CrimsonML]

This was helpful, thanks a alot Leila!

[@viratchhaya4936]

This is awesome!!

[@chandrashekarmreddy1076]

This was very helpful thanks

[@jordanmcdonald3280]

I was having issues with getting the Bucket ID's, thanks for this!

[@wayneedmondson1065]

Interesting! Thanks Leila. Thumbs up!!

[@stroye5438]

Great Stuff! THANKS!!

[@jennerperiasamy4734]

Very good video Leila, clearly explaining the steps with a practical example. I would like to see how task can also be delegated to a set of team members. Then I can use an Excel RAIL, completely linked with planner tasks. Could you please make a part 2 training video.

[@manuelacosta5981]

You are soooooo amazing!!!! It helped me so much!!! Thanks

[@j.l.2013]

Thank you so much for all the value you create for my team and me! I'm aiming to improve my companie's overall productivity and this helped a ton! I was wondering if it would be possible to send a task to multiple plans, each in a different team? Again, thank you for making these great videos! Cheers, Joe

[@LogicQuest]

Awesome..thank you.

[@GiteshBajaj]

Oh man... Great... A big thank

[@Joymf24]

Amazing, you are awesome, thanks

[@amoorinet..]

Thanks so much gharani God bless you 🙏🙏

[@hallyssonfernandes9211]

Muito obrigado. Parabéns pelo vídeo. Muito prático e bem explicado. Thank you so much. Congratulations by the video. Very practical and well explained.

[@bikecrash611]

Excellent video Leila! 👏 I have a bunch of monthly recurring tasks I set up in planner manually each month. I must try this to automate the process 😁

[@LeilaGharani]

Hope it will come in handy for your tasks.

[@user-fl6tb1xm5t]

ありがとうございます！

[@davidcchambers]

Your presentation reminded me of a well choreographed ballet. Beautifully displayed and articulated. Microsoft’s new Power Automate may not require code writing but thinking like a developer helps, evidenced by going back to initialize the variable. I am looking forward to spending more time with this tool and perhaps revising some existing VBA projects to utilize Flow. Thank you for the wonderful posts. I enjoy watching and learning from the results you and your team put so much effort into.

[@LeilaGharani]

Thanks a lot, David! 😊

[@jcbiosca]

Thanks a lot, i always learn with you.

[@LeilaGharani]

Glad to hear that.

[@user-so5yb1tq9i]

thank you

[@RaeSindy9573]

This is super great! I love watching your videos and they have been great to get my Power Automate skills off the ground. But if you're looking for another super helpful video idea (though I'm not sure if its possible) but it would be great to see you break down how to use planner checklist items to update a SharePoint list with certain checklist items getting checked off also toggling a Yes/No column item. If not a SharePoint list then maybe updating a corresponding column in Excel?

[@dhanyatamittal3076]

Good one Leila

[@sanjayaais8495]

Thanks Leila for sharing these wonderful ways to boost productivity. I have seen using power automate for workflow approvals, if there is a video on that let us know the link.

[@billprice792]

Thanks for the tip. The bucketId issue caught me for 1/2 day. I knew it needed the id and not the name but could not get the right combination of Expressions to work. It kept erroring out or passing a null value. Your videos are awesome and I always steal a little nugget of information from you. Peace.

[@LeilaGharani]

That's great to hear, Bill!

[@yulinliu850]

Cool.

[@CTSza]

This tutorial was exactly what I was looking for! Trying to setup an excel calendar that generates tasks to planner so this was extremely helpful. Is there a way for me to specify the priority of the task in the flow?

[@nicolerajan5237]

I’m loving your tutorials, thank you! I have a question, can you share an email in teams/planner? Eg if an email needs actioning and has an attachment, can it be uploaded directly from outlook to a task and be assigned to someone?

[@fareedgee4485]

Nice

[@sonicmaster1990]

Thank you for all of your great videos and tips! Do you have tips for a Flow that sends an email/notification based on a date in Excel? If I have a chart of training due dates, what can help me get/send automatic notifications?

[@excelmastervba]

Hi Leila, that is just what our company needs! Thanks a lot again. It's like magic 💫. I also need to integrate more of Power Automate 💪💪 to save time. 🚀 How do you always come up with these good ideas? Incredible 😀

[@LeilaGharani]

Wonderful! Glad you liked it.

[@sayoung190]

Thank you so much Leila. Is there a way to automate creating tasks in MS Projects from selected rows in excel? Similar to what you did in this video? Also, could the logic you used to specify the buckets be used to specify the type of the tasks in projects? Thanks again for your answers/feedback.

[@alexanderadamov7883]

Fantastic video as always, Leila! Thank you so much. If you have not already can you please make a video on how to automatically create renewal reminder in Planner from a list of expiration dates in Excel (memberships, contracts, etc.) - 6 months before said expiration? Just to be clear - when the 6 mo mark is reached a reminder (task) is created in Planner automatically to renew the expiring item. Thanks again.

[@garethmiddleton4272]

Hi Leila - great video. Can this be done for on multiple lines if you assign all the "dynamic" data in the table columns? Doing dozens, if hundreds of tasks could get tedious doing it one at a time. Thanks. Gareth

[@mostafa4321]

Thank you Leila complicated tasks simplifies as usual. I am liking your power to automate content. Can you create a series for power apps in 365.

[@LeilaGharani]

Glad you enjoy the series. I have a video coming up for Power Apps next Tuesday 😀.

[@mostafa4321]

@@LeilaGharani awesome

[@KellyHart-gk8hg]

Hi! This tutorial is wonderful. Thank you for sharing! I am having success running the flow. However, my due date is populating in Planner as one day prior to my selected date. Any advice?

[@alvaromorales2866]

Thank you for this tutorial. It helped me a lot. It would be great to have a 2nd advanced part to include colour labels and checklist in the task that are also specified on Excel and if we can make a recurrent task (for example, to create a new identical task with due date in three months when the task is check as completed.

[@paularodriguezcabrera9673]

hi, did you can?

[@vijayarjunwadkar]

Leila, you are at your best and this video is no exception! But somehow, Power Automate does not seem to be easy. That said, if I revise this and previous related videos, I am sure I will get the grip. So thanks for sharing! if you have any additional hints to share, more than welcome! Cheers! 😊👍

[@LeilaGharani]

Thank you Vijay. Power Automate took me some time to get the hang of and I'm only at the beginning.

[@dgjanes917]

Most important thing to do is just play with it. I'm sure that's all Leila did to get to the point she's at. Fortunately we have these videos to give us a huge head start :)... or to help us find our way when we stumble

[@sanketpathak8363]

Your video is of super help. What if we need to add the labels from excel too?

[@anjdiola5113]

Thanks for this. Do you have video for Project Management tool? :)

[@pallabchakraborty8291]

Very helpful. How to update the data back to the excel like completion status and comments etc from planner back to the excel

[@hervesumu5909]

Hi Leila, thank for this great video, it's been really helpful. Have you ever been able to create a flow that would work the other, updating Excel from Planner? I would be grateful for some help. Many thanks

[@Natwiechers]

Perfect video! Many thanks! To also add a responsible person can I use the same logic as da date?

[@ritakapp6822]

Hi! Thanks for this video! Can this be done to macro-enabled excel?

[@thegaminglearning]

Hi Leila, I am always amazed by your dynamic contents. I am still a novice in power automation. I just wanted to know how I may send an email after a due date from an excel bunch of rows. I am trying but always messed up. It would be a huge help.

[@davidblake6199]

I love your awesome videos. I manage a team that collectively work on multiple plans (we call projects). Is there a way to get a list of cards assigned to each user across multiple plans? I would need the name of the plan, name of the card within that plan, start date & end date, and who the card is assigned to. Ideally it would also be very helpful if it managed multiple users being assigned to the same card. Challenging I know - but any help would be appreciated.

[@dandanakan0]

Dear Leila, thanks for your upload. Would it also be possible to assign these tasks to indicated individuals in another column in excel?

[@mariasaba8091]

Great video thank you! If I have a few forms and I'd like to remind my team to use them at a fixed recurring time per year. Is it best to create a list with a reminder or create recurring email reminder. Which Microsoft tool would work best? Or is there a video on this topic Which I can watch. Thank you.

[@little.dragon1246]

How do I get to do list, tasks and planner to go into outlook calendar? How would I use planner and power automate for both personal and business? Thank you very much again. I love this channel. I use outlook calendar for everything as my life calendar

[@Karrsmbs]

Hello and good day! Where can I find the Excel sheet you showed in the video? Or do I need to create one in order to proceed with the tutorial?

[@kirtishalaka387]

Hi, thank you for the video. Can we update/change the start & due dates (or any other field) of the existing tasks from the revised excel?

[@mcd22630]

Great, now I have to come up with more tasks so I can truly leverage the capabilities of these tools. So goodbye extra sleep.

[@LeilaGharani]

😁 No goodbye to sleep. Take your time. I think these tools will be around for a while.

[@AleMelloMacTutorial]

Hi. Thanks for your explanation, very useful. But I need to go a little further. I have some status in my workflow (waiting, producing, revising, concluded). They're specified in my spreadsheet column. I'd like to automatically move that row to specific bucket, based on its status. Is it possible? I've tried using your bucket input explanation, but I wish it could be done automatically. And more, is there a way to automatically change task's bucket based on its label color? Thanks for your attention.

[@emifran]

Hi ty for the tutorial is very usefull. I have a question, we can assign responsible automatically to the task like the date?

[@chezleon]

Hi Leila. Thank you for this video. Do you have the same tuto to do the opposite action : extract Planner to Excel File with multiple Plans and Buckets ? Thx. Regards

[@ravinwood]

This was very insightful. The topic is something that I've been thinking about for a while now, but I never had a plan on how or why to implement something like this. What was not covered is what happens when the task is completed in Teams? does it stay on the excel sheet or gets removed? Can you backtrack form Teams to excel to show that that task has been completed on there?

[@prathapsekarkudly]

This is great, Can you please show the flow for updating an existing task from Excel to Planner or Excel to Outlook calendar. thanks

[@matthewcrawford6737]

Thank you for doing this video. Would you consider showing how to link Project online and planner? So high level managers can see how project is progressing in project, leaving engineers and techs to work day to day in the planner environment. Many people show how it is done with their exclusive add in's, but can it be done just in the office 365 / Teams environment?

[@manjuswami1823]

Good

[@KevinDMarshall69]

This is really helpful and I’ve now set this up for the team I manage. I do have a question though if that’s OK? My team all have their own plans (9) and I can see them all together on the dashboard but is there a way I can see them all on one schedule? That’d help me with capacity planning each week. 😊

[@itsmaryc]

Hi, in Power Automate 365, when adding an input of "Text" in "Instant cloud flow" for a selected row of excel online for business, how can I find the option to drop-down list of options?

[@JDEK5000]

Great Video!!! love it! but what about if only one cell in the excel sheet is empty? how does the flow not fail with that empty cell? Please help

[@rekhamcnutt7076]

This is so helpful! Thank you!! Is there a way to auto-add checklist items rather than notes?

[@theman707a6]

Yes, under the "update task details" action, you will find checklist items

[@diegovillalobos8754]

Impressive thanks! Can you help me? Is it possible to make an excel with a list of all tasks for all collaborators across different plans?

[@yurybobrovsky9560]

Hi Leila. 1) Add domain users to D-colomn. 2) Send task to one of them. 3) Automatically check an update tasks status in your workbook. 4) Alert user before 1 day (or hour or minute ...) task should be completed

[@umairismail9555]

I also have same requirement. Thanks

[@jorgecaceres2421]

Is it possible to refresh closed excel workbooks with power automate? I've been looking for a way through VBA without success. Please make a tutorial on this if it can actually be done. Thanks!

[@Franceskineos]

It will be very useful a video about importing information from excel into the triggers dialog of an instant trig, to feed conditional input drop down field or to enable the trigger button based on a value in the excel table . For example a reservation service over a finite daily resource, that gives feedback to the users that for a certain day the reservation are over and disable the trigger until the user select another day.

[@LeilaGharani]

Great suggestion, Francesco!

[@craigmoore4100]

Hello, looking for a way to move a completed task in Planner to the Completed bucket with Power Automate. Any advice?

[@MrDasichi]

In planner can the task template be modified? For example, I would like to add extra note sections or check list sections and label them.

[@haris7412]

how to add task dependency? or is there a way to rename list of projects? for example there is a simple task "KZbin Video", every youtube video will have set of items assign to a member like research, video shoot, video edit, video thumbnail, publishing, etc... they all are dependent on each other. is there a way to create a template or duplicate project list having each named as ABC video shoot, ABC Video edit.. etc?

[@paulschneider6308]

Can you update Planner tasks using an Excel spreadsheet as well? In other words, if a Planner task has already been created, but has outdated information, can you use you Excel spreadsheet to update the tasks?

[@chandrashekarmreddy1076]

Hi Leila, Can you please let me know the steps how to migrate MS team Planner from one tenant to other tenant. Your inputs are really appreciated, thanks in advanced ma'am

[@rishabhshreyas6098]

I have an excel sheet where I am tracking budget forecase and utilization. Can we connect Planer into Excel and run the budget calculation based on Planner data?

[@alphacabangis3745]

Amazing video. Wishlist: Can we see the same method to update tasks with Labels 😁. Thanks

[@paularodriguezcabrera9673]

hi, did you can?

[@powerbi9048]

Hi, can you teach update and export bucket and task from planner to excel?

[@wfeismann]

Another great video Leila. Will Power Automate work with Outlook to automatically download attachments?

[@LeilaGharani]

Yes. I have a video coming up end of April where we send emails from Excel with attachments. That will give you some ideas on how you can setup flows that send attachments with Outlook.

[@wfeismann]

@@LeilaGharani That sounds great, however I think I am looking for the opposite. When receiving excel attachments via email, have outlook automatically save the attachment in a particular file. Any luck or direction there?

[@markmoyers4610]

It would be a good idea to mention which actions, etc. require a Premium account. I built a really neat flow that required a Premium license. If I had built it from scratch, I would have seen the Premium indicator but I built it using the 'describe' method.

[@RamilTeodosio]

Having issue with the GroupID and PlanID. How are those set up?

[@dherpin4874]

Is this a onetime flow or will this process continue to populate planner as I add rows to my excel?

[@swankyshivy]

great video as usual. keep them coming. how can i add attachments to a row and also how can update a cell in row to say that the flow was successful?

[@LeilaGharani]

For attachments, you can add the file name in the row and define the path in the flow. It can then search for the file name in the folder and use that as the attachment. I have a video coming up end of April that shows this process. We send emails with attachments from Excel - the setup is similar to what you'll need.

[@swankyshivy]

@@LeilaGharani thank u looking forward to video. keep up great work. i learn alot from you

[@yoginishingadia3098]

Is it possible to send email with charts fir each bucket to management recursively.. pls suggest

[@leighcarrington6021]

Hi Leila, your video has been very helpful but I can't seem to assign a person to a task based on a name in the excel sheet. I have tried adding email address, exact names but still no Joy. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks

[@LiveLoveMazy]

Hi Leila, do you have tutorial to do the opposite please? ie update excel from planner

[@yoginishingadia3098]

Hi.. is it possible to get audit trail of assignment across each bucket and time spend in each bucket fir task

[@faith0107]

I want to bulk load task fr excel and add those task to existing bucket. How do I accomplish this?

[@pawenowak7004]

Leila how can we add labels to task or update it?

[@little.dragon1246]

How i can linked planner to outlook , automate and Microsoft to do list

[@rajatsabharwal8642]

hey i need help regarding this power automate and planner thing

[@kerenferrisandco]

Can you do this for Tasks?

[@jwall62]

I just can't grasp automate...☹️

[@ArjunKumar-cz4qr]

*Hello there, Leila Arjun.* *I hope everything is going well with you. Your films are usually useful and entertaining. MVP Leila Gharani (It's You Definitely)* *taught me more about Microsoft Office Excel.* *I'd want you to make a video on Microsoft Power Automate and how to automate a work that involves special type of searching* *from Google and filling that information in a website database type of form.* *How do you solve the problem when the destination of certain information from a website changes? Using Power Automate*

[@Ghillie_Monster]

I have watched multiple videos on this process, but still haven't found one that addresses what I'm looking for. Maybe you can help? I want to utilize an Excel task list into Planner, but I'm tracking multiple projects that have the same tasks but different due dates. For example (Each | represents a new column) "Task One | Client 1 Due Date | Client 2 Due Date |.... " this can go up to 25+ clients. Is there anything like this out there? Thanks.

[@adityadhage8452]

Hello Leila, I dont know if you can help me with this. I have a capacity survey response in excel format its has lot of questions, drop down list and table. I am trying to automate a process where a Demand planner will initiate request via forms capturing the material details and demand for consecutive years. Once the form is submitted the details ( Component number , volumes , unit of measurement ,etc ) will be captured on another excel sheet and that excel file will be forwarded to the supplier via outlook email. Supplier then downloads the file completes the survey and sends this file back to us( Link will be provided ). Then that data is then visualized on a power Bi dashboard. Can you guide me with this? Thank you. :)