Give the client access to their tasks

The deal board holds everything: the conditions precedent, the documents still to come, the fee estimate and the team's own notes. The client has items to deliver, such as board minutes, KYC documents and signed powers of attorney, and the lender's counsel has conditions to tick off. Rather than chasing them by email, let them update their own items on the board. A permission set decides exactly what they see and change, so the fees, the internal notes and the other workstreams stay with the firm.

Two questions decide the set. Which tasks are theirs to update? And what else do they need to see to do it?

Permission sets are for the board's managers. Anyone else finds Permissions greyed out: "Only board managers can use this."

The neighbouring Usage option is also for board managers only. A set's Export action does not give its members access to those figures; see check who uses the deal board.

Create the set

1. Open the board, click Board above it and choose Permissions.

   

2. On a board with no sets yet, click Create permission set. Otherwise open the set list at the top left and choose New set…. Name the set after the people in it, such as "Client: Beta Holding" or "Lender's counsel", and click Next: Board access. The Name suggestions below the field only fill in the name; you choose the access in the next steps.

   

A new set takes you through it one step at a time: Name, Board access, Views, Actions, People and Review. Click Next to move on and Back to return. The steps down the left show what each one has set, and take you back to any step you have done; on a small screen they narrow to numbered circles. When you open a set later, it opens with every setting on one screen, with Task board, Views and Actions on the left. Step by step switches to the steps, and All settings back again.

Decide what they see and change

3. Under Board access, choose the Access to the whole board: No access hides it from them, View lets them see everything but change nothing, and Edit lets them see and change everything. One level suits a client who may follow the whole checklist.

4. When they should see only part of the board, click Customise per task group, column or cell. The grid lists the task groups, tasks and subtasks down the side and the board's columns across the top, and each has a control for No access, View or Edit.

   • Set All task groups and All columns first. They apply to everything, including task groups and columns added later.
   • Then set the exceptions: the lender's conditions precedent group to Edit, the fee and internal notes columns to No access.
   • To change a single cell, click it to cycle through the levels. Right-click a cell to reset it.

   

A task, task group or column you set yourself wins over the All levels. Set a column to Edit and they can change it on every task they can see; set a task to Edit and they can change all of it. Where a task and a column you set disagree, the one you changed last wins for that cell. No access on a task or a column always hides it. On a task group's row you can also set one column for that group alone, and tasks added to the group later follow it. Use the same permission level across the whole board takes the set back to a single level.

5. Click Next. Under Views, choose which of the board's views they can open. With All views, including new ones on, they can open every view, including views added later. Switch Visible off on a view to hide just that one. Then choose their Landing view: the view they start on when they open the board. Leave it on Land on the board's default view if you have no view made for them. See give each workstream its own view.

6. Click Next. Under Actions, switch on what they may do beyond changing cells: Add tasks, Add task groups, Delete tasks, Move tasks, Import, Export and Edit dashboards. Each works only where the set already lets them: they add, move and delete tasks in the groups they can edit, and an export gives them only what they can see. Edit dashboards lets them add and change widgets on the dashboards connected to the board. Under Comments, choose Hidden, Can read or Can read and write; it applies to the tasks they can see. Internal updates are never shown to people in a set.

   

Add the people

7. Click Next. Under People, everyone in the set is listed, with a search and a filter for internal, external and teams. Click Add people. Pick colleagues or teams from the firm; someone not on the matter gets this board only, not the matter. To bring in people from outside the firm, fill in their name and email under Invite external people, with Add another for each extra person. The invitations go out with this set already chosen.

   

8. Click Next: Review. Check before you save lists what the set gives, a card each for Board access, Views, Actions and People; Change takes you back to that step. Click Save permission set. If the set needs no saving, the button says Done.

When you change a set on one screen, click Save at the bottom; the line beside it says how many members the changes apply to.

You can also invite someone outside the firm from Share on the board: choose External and pick their set under Permission Sets.

Check what they will see

If a set would leave its members seeing nothing, a note on Review and near the top of the set says so, for example "This set gives no access to the board, so members won't see anything. Choose View or Edit." The set can still be saved, but fix it before you add people.

9. With the set saved, click Preview as this set. The board opens as its members see it, with "Previewing as" and the set's name in a bar along the top. Nothing can be changed while you preview.

   

10. Click Exit preview to go back to your own view of the board.

Tips from practice

• Keep internal comments internal. In the task panel, write what is for the firm only under Internal updates. People in a permission set cannot open that tab; they see Updates.
• Hiding a column in a view is not enough. A view only tidies what is shown. Fees and working notes belong on No access in the set.
• One set per side. People in more than one set get the most each set allows, and the member's chip shows which other sets they are in. Keep the client and the other side in separate sets so neither sees the other's items.
• Duplicate for the next party. Duplicate set in the menu beside the set's name copies everything; change the groups and add the new people.

See also: produce the CP checklist for the other side and review and end outside access.