Update User Profile Properties In SharePoint 2016 Using Nintex Workflow

SharePoint 2016 general availability had been announced in the Future Of SharePoint conference in May 2016. The series that discusses the installation of SharePoint 2016 in Azure can be found at C# Corner from the below links.

Nintex is a premium technology partner for SharePoint. With the announcement of SharePoint 2016, Nintex has made the announcement of the general availability of Nintex Workflow 2016 July 11 2016.

In this article we will see how to update the user profile properties using Nintex Workflow. In order to capture the information used to update the user profile, we will be maintaining a configuration list named ‘User Profile’. Within the list we will maintain the User profile properties as list columns. In our case ‘About Me’ and ‘Department’. Based on the update in this list the Nintex workflow will be triggered and the User Profile will be updated.



Ensure that the ‘About Me’ and ‘Department’ fields are editable by going to the Central Administration settings.



The scope of the article will be.

  • Modify the list item column to trigger workflow
  • Update the user profile properties based on the column value.

Let’s go ahead to the primary list where we will be running our Nintex Workflow. In our case it is the ‘User Profile’ List. Select ‘Create a Workflow in Nintex Workflow’.



This will open up the Nintex Workflow designer. We can select the actions from the left pane. Add the ‘Update User Profile’ action to the form.



Once the action is added, it will show the condition missing warning.



Click on Configure button in the action.



This opens up the form where the user profile information that needs to be updated can be entered. In the field ‘User’ we have to add the domain user whose user profile has to be updated. Though it can be hard coded, let's automate the user profile updating by fetching the User Name from the list item. So click the browse button next to User field and select the list item field ‘Name’ from Item Properties tab.



Specify the credentials using which the user profile store will be accessed.



Specify the username in the format Domain\Username, else we will get the below exception.



In the Profile Properties tab select ‘About Me’.



From the browse button select the List Column value ‘About Me’ which will be used to update the ‘About Me’ User profile property.



Now add the ‘Title’ User Profile property to the form.



From the browse button select the List Column value ‘Title’ which will be used to update the ‘Title’ User profile property.



Finally add the ‘Department’ User Profile property to the form.



From the browse button select the List Column value ‘Department’ which will be used to update the ‘Department’ User profile property.



The configuration form will eventually look like below:



Upon Configuration the workflow design will look like below:



Now set the workflow triggering condition. Here we are setting it to ‘Start when items are modified’ so that the workflow triggers on item update.



Now Publish the workflow.



Specify the workflow name, description and submit.



The workflow is being published.



Finally the publishing is completed.



Now let’s head over to the Configuration List ‘User Profile’ and update the record for the user with new user profile properties.



The workflow has been triggered and it has run to completion. Thus the workflow has updated the User Profile based on the item update that happened in the list.



Going to the User Profile page we can see the updated values.



Summary

Thus we saw how to update the SharePoint user profile properties of the user using Nintex Workflow 2016.