Organizing Program Participants: Roles, Departments, and Teams

On Applauz, each program participant is assigned a "Role."

By default, Applauz has three predefined Roles: Administrator, Manager, and Employee. You can also create custom Roles for your program, but more on that later.

Roles control what program participants can do within the program. But Applauz allows for a lot of flexibility. Even the default Roles can be modified by the program Administrator.

Assigning Roles is necessary because it dictates which actions, otherwise known as permissions, a user is capable of performing.

In this article, you will learn how to manage Roles and the associated Permissions. You will also learn how to classify participants into Departments and Teams.

Learning how to organize participants is essential because it allows for more efficient management of your program.

Feel free to jump to the section that is most relevant to you.

What we'll cover:

• Basics: Default permissions for each Role
• How to manage Roles, their permissions and the users associated to them
• How to create, manage, and assign participants to Departments
• How to create, manage, and assign participants to Teams

Basics: Default Permissions for Each Role

1. Program Administrator: is the primary person who administrates the company's program. All Permissions for this Role are turned on. 
   
2. Managers: are program participants who are selected by the Administrator to help with the company's day-to-day recognition efforts. They have access to various program management features by default. 
   
3. Employees: are program participants added to the platform by the program Administrator or Manager. Employees have limited access, but this can be modified by the Administrator.

Note: You don’t have to be an Administrator at your company to be the Administrator of your Applauz program. Likewise, anyone can be designated as an Applauz “Manager,” regardless of their official title at your organization.

Actions common to all Roles

On the Newsfeed, ALL Applauz users can:

• Publish a post
• React to a post
• Comment on a post
• Recognize another participant (peer-to-peer recognition)
• Create a Company Poll

The Program Administrator

The person who initially launched the Company’s Applauz account is automatically designated as the Administrator.

There is only one Administrator on Applauz.

The Administrator retains full control of the program’s settings, options, permissions, and participants.

By default, the Applauz Program Administrator can:

• Edit the program's basic info (company info, logo, language, etc.)
• Enable optional program features (ex. Perks & Service Awards)
• Buy Applauz Points and distribute Recognition Allowances
• View Applauz Culture & Engagement Reports
• Buy licenses and assign them or revoke them
• Add or remove employees from the program
• Create or delete Departments and Teams
• Create and manage Roles 
• Turn on the Pulse Survey Module

Program Managers

Managers are the people tasked with ensuring employees are active on the platform. The Manager Role on Applauz is often assigned to actual company managers. In short, it closely matches with the company's org chart.

By default Managers have permissions similar to the Administrator except they cannot:

• Edit an employee's shipping address
• Buy Applauz Points and distribute Recognition Allowances
• Create and manage Roles
• Buy licences

Employees

Employees use Applauz to bond with coworkers, recognize their achievements, and engage with coworkers via the company Newsfeed.

By default, all employees can:

• Publish a Newsfeed post
• React to a Newsfeed post
• Recognize another participant (Peer-to-Peer Recognition)
• Create a company Poll
• Shop the Rewards Marketplace

Note: For Employees to access additional actions and features the program Administrator must enable these options by managing permissions for that Role.

Managing Roles

Again, there are three default participant Roles on Applauz:

• Administrator
• Manager
• Employee

If you click on the Employees>Roles menu you'll be directed to a page that displays these three default Roles.

Clicking on any of the cards displays a list of names. These are the participants assigned to that Role. 

Creating new Roles

If you wish to add a custom Role (other than the default one's available) you can click on '+New Role' in the top right corner of the application screen.

You will be asked to give the new Role a name and hit 'Create.' That's it!

Adding or removing members from a Role

Normally Roles are assigned upon the initial creation of a new user profile.

But, you can add/remove program participants from a specific Role anytime. Navigate to Employees>Roles and click on the Role you want to modify.

This action is useful to add multiple participants to a Role at once.

When you come to the list, click on the green arrow to add participants to the group, or the red arrows to remove them.

Remember: Always save changes by clicking on 'Save Users.' 

Managing permissions for any Role

By default, each Role is limited to perform certain actions and access certain features on Applauz, otherwise known as Permissions.

Naturally, the Program Administrator has the maximum level of permission granted of anyone. Applauz allows for flexibility, though!

Administrators can selectively grant Managers and Employees (or any custom Role) access to perform any actions available in the program.

To edit permission for a Role navigate to Employees>Roles.

Select the Role you wish to modify. Click on the 'Edit Permissions' tab in the top right. 

You'll be directed to a page where you will see all the default permissions that this Role currently has access to.

The blue toggle buttons indicate a permission is turned on. If the button is grey, it indicates that permission is off.

To grant access to a specific permission, just click on the grey buttons to toggle them on. Once permission is granted, the button will turn blue.

How to Manage Departments

Departments are set up to mirror your organizational hierarchy.

Departments on Applauz should closely resemble how your organization groups its divisions. A "Department Owner" must also be assigned to head the group. 

Note: Normally, Department Owners occupy the Role of Manager as well. However, any participant (regardless of Role) can be assigned as a Department Owner.

To access Departments,  navigate to the Employees>Departments. You will be redirected to a page that looks like the image below where you have a global view of all the Departments and the heads assigned to each.

Creating a new Department

To add a new Department, simply click on the '+New Department' button in the top right corner. 

You will be asked to give the Department a name and assign a Department Owner. Hit 'Create' to finalize. That's it!

Adding/removing members from a Department

To add/remove participants from a given Department, simply navigate to the menu Employees>Departments.

Click on the Department you wish to modify. 

You can add member(s) to Department by clicking on the green arrow and remove them by clicking on the red arrows.

Remember: always confirm changes by clicking on 'Save Users' at the bottom right.

How to Manage Teams

Teams let's you further classify your program participants into bespoke groups.

Teams can be department specific, for example you can create a team for the junior members of a department. Or Teams can be used to mimic any internal organizational structure. For instance, you can create a Team for your company's social committee.

The purpose of Teams is to group Employees together to filter statistics or assign them to Team-specific actions like Polls or Goals. Most of the functionality available in Departments is also available in Teams.

Teams are similar to Departments, with the main difference being there is no team "Owner." 

The Teams menu can be accessed by navigating to Employees>Teams. This will take you to a page where you can see all the Teams in your program.

Adding a new Team

To add a new Team, navigate to the Team menu and simply click on the 'New Team' button in the top right corner. 

Simply give the Team a name and hit 'create' to start a new Team.

Adding/removing members from a Team

To add/remove members from a given Team, navigate to Employees>Teams.

Click on the Team you want to modify. You'll then be redirected to a page that looks like the one below.

You can add member(s) to a Team by clicking on the green arrow and remove them by clicking on the red arrows.

Remember: always confirm changes by clicking on 'Save Users' at the bottom right.