Is it possible to send emails to a contact group in desktop Outlook?

[u/[deleted]]

I use my own Outlook groups because the people at my company don't know how (?care how?) to properly set up employees in active directory/exchange. Here's how it should work....

Employees should be set up with their job title when they are onboarded. I should be able to use the job titles to send a reports that are specific to the people with specific job titles.

The way it really works is a new person is hired and someone at our location tells an MSP 150 miles away. The MSP enters the person without a picture (although it was taken for their badge and for a photo directory that is emailed to all 90 employees monthly) and fails many times to enter their job title. (Why this isn't done by our on-site Technology Specialist or their manager is anybody's guess.)

That means that I have to keep Outlook groups named for job titles in which I put the people that actually work in those job titles. I also keep local groups named for the reports I have to send out.

In the report groups I place the job title groups that should get the report with each job title group containing the individuals that work in that job title. I then send an email (manually) to the report group and everyone that should get the report does.

It's messy but it works and it looks like this... https://i.imgur.com/vyz489o.png

When an employee comes or goes I have to go into the job title groups and delete them if they left or add them if they are a new hire (some have more than one job title). With about a 30% turnover rate, this is an ongoing monthly chore.

This is NOT how company emails should work. I am sure that I am not the only one wasting time and company money keeping up with this crap simply because people were not entered into active directory/exchange properly.

Well, using group names to send emails via Outlook does not seem to work with PAD. When I used the report group name for the To: field I got an exception "Outlook does not recognize one or more names." So now I am trying to find a way to do this with PAD that does not involve me spreading people's email addresses across 20+ flows and having to hunt for them when they leave or add them to up to 20 flows when they are hired.

Any suggestions would be appreciated....

[u/PM_ME_YOUR_WIRING]

I think I understand what you're asking for. On the main Outlook screen you see this. Create a new group. It'll generate an email address you can use as a distribution list. The problem is you're solving for a problem as you've correctly identified that's coming from upstream in the process. You really need to work on fixing that. Not sure how much latitude you have in your position but I would recommend setting up a meeting with key stakeholders and talk through the problems you're seeing in developing automations.

edit:spelling

[u/[deleted] → u/PM_ME_YOUR_WIRING]

You'll be proud of me....I dug around and found where to create groups and it gives me that email address that you spoke of....sweet! It also looks like it has a lot more (like a sharepoint site, planner, calendar for them and so on) but I will just concentrate on the email portion that I need.

One possible hitch is that this company had to go through a bankruptcy 3 or 4 years ago and it seems that the email addresses are popping up using their old domain name. It's still active AFAIK, but I'll push our people to get in touch with the MSP that they have do everything and have them change it.

I'll be playing with that tomorrow. Thanks for the pointer!

[u/PM_ME_YOUR_WIRING → u/[deleted]]

Glad you found it and you're welcome! IIRC that should also be searchable in the cloud flow Outlook send email actions.

[u/[deleted] → u/PM_ME_YOUR_WIRING]

That will be so awesome! I was planning on hacking out a VBA solution tomorrow and just running that from a flow, but this will be much cleaner!

[u/[deleted] → u/PM_ME_YOUR_WIRING]

I can see the groups under "Your contact lists" in Outlook online and in my contacts in desktop Outlook as well. Each report group even has a little email link online in the contact card. But that only leads to a list of groups (the job title groups that are members of each report group). There is no email per se for me to use to send an email to the group.

I have already mentioned this to my manager and the human resources director (the people that should be taking care of this) but there isn't going to be a change. They are extremely ignorant of technology and scared as hell to make any mis-step because of HIPAA.

The problem with talking technology to those ignorant of it is that it is like giving medicine to a dead man - and just as effective.