How can I look up the value in one list and return a value from a second list?

Question

I have 2 lists. One has staff ID's and the other has staff ID's along with additional information. In the first list, I would like to create a 'lookup' column that looks at the staff ID in the first list and returns values from the second (ie who the line manager is).

The reason I am doing this is to some of the fields 'read only' while other fields in the first list can be updated by the user. I do not want the user to amend the existing data in the first list, but force them to make changes in the appropriate change fields in the first list.

Any suggestions?

Answer 1

Off the top of my head, the only way I can think to accomplish that is to use a workflow to look up the manager information on new/edit actions and add it to the original list item. Then customize the list new/edit forms (with Designer) to make the field read-only (or just remove it completely) to prevent end users from changing the value.

Note this solution would not update an existing list item if the manager information is changed until the original item is updated causing the workflow to fire.