Improved View Filters in CRM 2013

Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 introduced filtering for system views across multiple entities which allows users to apply Excel-like filters to different sets of data in order to drill down and categorise records. This feature has been extended in CRM 2013 so users can save custom filters into a new personal view.

The screenshot above shows a list of Account records in CRM. I want to filter the list of Account to display only those which are located in the city of “Auckland”. I then want to be able to save this filtered list as a new personal view, so I can keep an eye on all of the Account records within my territory.

If I were to do this in CRM 2011, I could apply the filter on the fly, but there would be no way for me to save the filtered list as a personal view. The only way to achieve this would be to run an Advanced Find query with the appropriate filter conditions, and then save the view manually. For those of you who are familiar with Advanced Find, you will understand how this requires a lot of clicks.

Let’s take a look at the process of filtering a view and then saving it as a personal view in CRM 2013. Firstly, click on the filter icon on the view and then apply the appropriate filters.

Now that we have applied our filter, we should only see the Accounts located in “Auckland”.

Next, click on the view selector drop-down and then click on Save Filters as New View.

Enter a name for the new view and then click on Save.

The new view will now be available for you to use at any time. You can modify the saved view in Advanced Find if you wish, and share the view with other users or teams in your organisation!