Name instead of ID - SPD Workflow

Question

I have created a SharePoint 2010 workflow using SPDesigner2010. This workflow sends out a html formatted email using several combined dynamic strings whenever someone publishes a blog post. The dynamic "live" data pulled using lookup and displayed in the final email is: Title, Created By, Category.

My problem is that when I use lookup for created by, the information pulled is the employee ID number. I would like to be able to use their full name instead of their respective ID number. When I check the list where the posts are stored, in the created by column the values are full names.

Summary: How can I have the full name of an employee appear instead of their ID number when using the lookup "created by" in a "Extract substring from index of string"?

Being able to do this would allow me to create a notification email for a sharepoint blog using the Title, Full Name and Blog Category.

If anyone could point me in the right direction it would bve very much appreciated.

Answer 1

Use a Set workflow variable action to create a new string variable called fullName. In it, set the value to be the Current Item, Created By field returning Display Name. Then use that variable in your subject.