Overview
User relationships are hierarchical based on committee structure and user profiles. Simply put, a user can only create users with lower level profiles than their own, and only within committees they have access to. Each User is assigned a User Profile, which determines their access to particular features and types of data.
Please keep in mind that our Support team can only administer the highest level user(s) for each organization. That person(s) is responsible for creating, managing, and administering all other users for their organization. Our staff cannot administer your users for you but we are happy to answer any questions you have!
Create a User Account
To create a User, start by searching for 'Users' in Sidebar (shown below). Alternatively, go to the Users section on the left side of the main menu and click on 'Users' in the expanded options.
Click on 'Add New User' in the top right corner.
Enter the email address for the User and select a committee. In some cases, there may only be one committee.
Once you've entered an email address, three suggested Account Names will appear for your convenience; if you'd like to create your own, select 'Custom Account Name.'
Select a User Profile. This determines their access to particular features and types of data. If necessary, set an expiration date. The 'Assign Access' option will also appear for state-based databases.
Finally, click 'Create User & Send Email.' If creating more than one User at a time, click 'Send Email & Create Another.' For information about editing other information about a User, click here.
Welcome Email
The email sent will contain the Committee name and the site name, as well as the URL that should be used for login going forward, as the link for invitation button expires after 7 days.
Generic Accounts
In some cases, campaigns or organizations may have many volunteers. In order to avoid having to create hundreds of separate users for volunteers, it may seem appealing to create generic volunteer accounts.
However, we strongly urge one individual per account for several reasons:
- Transparency: If someone makes a mistake when entering data, editing a contact record, or while doing anything else in the database, it is easier to identify which person performed that task if your users are not sharing accounts. It will also make it easier to resolve the issue, such as wiping inaccurate data from contact records.
- Ease: It is now easier than ever to avoid creating a user for each volunteer if necessary. Volunteers who are doing phone banking and canvassing can simply create their own ActionID and then canvass with MiniVAN and make calls via Open Virtual Phone Bank. To learn more about using ActionID for canvassing and phone banking, click here.
- Security: Should any volunteer appear to be doing anything dubious or submitting fake data, it is easier to identify that person and shut down or limit their access if each person has their own user account.
Best Practices
- If you are an administrative user and you will be out of town for a while, you may want to contact the support team to have them make someone else the administrator in your absence. Once you return, we can change it back. If you are leaving the organization, you'll want to let Support know who the new administrator will be so we can make that change.
- If one of your Users leaves the organization, we suggest making them Inactive.