Flow Action | Condition selection | Which record did I select?

[ericgilmore]

I have a Flow,

I added a Wait For Condition action (but I've encountered this other places)

I select my table,  lets say, [Project]

I add a condition [Project Status][is]....

But here's the issue, I have several Project Types, and Project Status is a reference.

So when I look for Project Status == Done, the drop-down displays...

Done

Done

Done

Done

In the Project Status table it has

{Status, Project Type}

Done, Canoe

Done, Bobcat

Done, Shoe

Done, Papoose

I want [Project Status][is][Done...Bobcat]

But I can't tell which Done is actually Project Type == Bobcat

I've done a simple lookup in the Project Status list selecting for Project Status == Done. By default it seems to return a list sorted by Create date, but can I trust that? Is that what the condition in my Flow action doing?

How can I tell which one I'm selecting in the flow?

[Pavan Srivastav]

Hello Eric,

The condition picker only displays the display value of the reference field, and when multiple records share the same display value (all four say "Done"), there is no way to visually distinguish them in the dropdown. You are essentially picking blind.

"Can I trust the sort order?" No. The dropdown in the condition picker does not guarantee any sort order. It is not reliably sorted by created date, name, or anything else you can depend on. Even if it looks consistent today, it is not a safe assumption to build a flow on.

"Is that what the condition in my Flow action doing?" What actually gets stored when you pick a value from that dropdown is the sys_id of the specific Project Status record — not the display value "Done". So whichever "Done" you happened to click is locked in by its sys_id. The problem is you have no way of knowing which sys_id you selected because they all showed the same label.

Change the display field on the Project Status table

If you have a combined field or can add one:

• Add a field like name or label that is populated as "Done - Bobcat", "Done - Canoe" etc.
• Set that field as the Display field on the table (Dictionary entry → check the Display checkbox)

Now the condition picker shows Done - Bobcat, Done - Canoe and the problem disappears everywhere simultaneously.

[Ankur Bawiskar]

@ericgilmore 

try to use flow variable and set that flow variable with the value you wish to check

then use that in Wait for Condition

💡 If my response helped, please mark it as correct ✅ and close the thread 🔒— this helps future readers find the solution faster! 🙏

[ericgilmore · Accepted solution]

While I believe @Pavan Srivastav did answer my question, what I actually did was this. Went to the Project Status table, found the entry I needed, renamed it "Done (Bobcat)", saved it. Went back into the flow, selected "Done (Bobcat)" for my condition. Save/Activated my flow, then went back to Project Status and changed the name from "Done (Bobcat)" back to "Done".

My reasoning was that I wouldn't need to do this on an ongoing basis, so a temporary change was OK. 😝