How to move multiple users to multiple OUs importing users from CSV and filtering by Active directory "Office" attribute

Question

I'm at a loss. I'm trying to move users from an onboarding CSV file to several different OUs after the account creation but I'm having issues with the syntax to achieve the desired results. I'm not too savvy with Powershell. Below is my code. Any help would be appreciated.

Import-Module ActiveDirectory
$office1 = "OU=OU NAME HERE,OU=OU NAME HERE,OU=OU NAME HERE,DC=DOMAIN,DC=com"
$office2 = "OU=OU NAME HERE,OU=OU NAME HERE,OU=OU NAME HERE,DC=DOMAIN,DC=com"
$office3 = "OU=OU NAME HERE,OU=OU NAME HERE,OU=OU NAME HERE,DC=DOMAIN,DC=com"
$office4 = "OU=OU NAME HERE,OU=OU NAME HERE,OU=OU NAME HERE,DC=DOMAIN,DC=com"
$office5 = "OU=OU NAME HERE,OU=OU NAME HERE,OU=OU NAME HERE,DC=DOMAIN,DC=com"
$office6 = "OU=OU NAME HERE,OU=OU NAME HERE,OU=OU NAME HERE,DC=DOMAIN,DC=com"

Import-Csv "C:\AD_Test.csv" | foreach ($user in $users){
$firstname = $user.'Legal First Name'.Trim()
$preferred_firstname = $user.'Preferred First Name'.Trim()
if($preferred_firstname){
    $firstname = $preferred_firstname
}

$lastname = $user.'Last Name'.Trim()
$displayname = $firstname + " " + $lastname
Get-ADUser -Identity $displayname -Filter {office -eq "China"} | Move-ADObject -TargetPath 
$office1
Get-ADUser -Identity $displayname-Filter {office -eq "Russia"} | Move-ADObject -TargetPath 
$office2
Get-ADUser -Identity $displayname -Filter {office -eq "US - Miami"} | Move-ADObject - 
TargetPath $office3
Get-ADUser -Identity $displayname -Filter {office -eq "US - Tampa} | Move-ADObject -TargetPath 
$office4
Get-ADUser -Identity $displayname -Filter {office -eq "US - Reno"} | Move-ADObject -TargetPath 
$office5
Get-ADUser -Identity $displayname -Filter {office -eq "US - Charleston"} | Move-ADObject - 
TargetPath $office6
}

Answer 1

First of all, you need to use a hash table that will help you determine to which Organizational Unit the user needs to be moved to.

Then, as explained in comments, -Identity allows you to search only by:

• A distinguished name
• A GUID (objectGUID)
• A security identifier (objectSid)
• A SAM account name (sAMAccountName)

You will be better of using -Filter or -LDAPFilter to try and find it, in below code I'm using a filter to search for it by CommonName OR SamAccountName OR DisplayName .

Lastly, you need to query the Office attribute for the user's, since this is the attribute that will help you determine to which OU the users have to be moved to.

I have added some inline comments to help you understand the script's logic. Also note the use of -WhatIf switch on Move-ADObject , with this switch in place no action will be performed:

Shows what would happen if the cmdlet runs. The cmdlet is not run.

After running the code and you consider it is doing what you expect it to do, you may remove this switch from the code.

As last peace of advise, have whom is giving you this CSV to put the user's attributes that can be searched by -Identity , other AD attributes are irrelevant for this script.

$map = @{
    'China'           = "China OU DistinguishedName"
    'Russia'          = "Russia OU DistinguishedName"
    'US - Miami'      = "Miami OU DistinguishedName"
    'US - Tampa'      = "Tampa OU DistinguishedName"
    'US - Reno'       = "Reno OU DistinguishedName"
    'US - Charleston' = "Charleston OU DistinguishedName"
}

foreach($line in Import-Csv "C:\AD_Test.csv") {

    $firstname = $line.'Legal First Name'.Trim()
    $preferred_firstname = $line.'Preferred First Name'.Trim()

    if($preferred_firstname){
        $firstname = $preferred_firstname
    }

    $lastname = $line.'Last Name'.Trim()
    $displayname = $firstname + " " + $lastname

    $param = @{
        # create a filter for this user
        # try to find him either by CommonName OR SamAccountName OR DisplayName
        LDAPFilter = "(|(cn=$displayName)(samAccountName=$displayName)(displayName=$displayName))"
        Properties = "Office"
    }

    
    # if the user could not be found in AD
    if(-not ($user = Get-ADUser @param)) {
        # display the warning
        Write-Warning "'$displayName' could not be found in AD."
        # and skip next logic
        continue
    }

    # if the user can be found in AD and the user's Office cannot be found in `$map`
    if(-not $map.ContainsKey($user.Office)) {
        # display the warning
        Write-Warning "Office for '$displayName' could not be determined, skipping."
        # and skip next logic
        continue
    }
    
    # if the user's Office can be found in `$map`, move it to the destination OU
    $user | Move-ADObject -TargetPath $map[$user.Office] -WhatIf
}