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Your team and their roles

Everyone at your firm signs in with their own login. Two settings decide what each person can do: their Access (Owner, Admin or Member) decides who runs the workspace, and their Title (Partner, Manager, Senior, Staff or Administrative) decides whose work and what money they see.

Add a team member

Owners and admins add people.

  1. Go to Team and click Add team member.
  2. Enter their Email, First name and Last name.
  3. Choose their Access and Title. Who can do what, beside the form, explains each choice.
  4. You can also add a Phone, Initials (shown on task cards and wherever the full name doesn't fit) and a Billing rate, their charge-out rate per hour.
  5. Click Add and invite.

Firmdesk emails them a link to choose their password. The link works once, for 3 days. Someone who already has a Firmdesk password gets no link: they sign in as usual and pick your firm.

Send the invite again

Until they choose a password, the Team list shows them as Invite pending. Open their page and, under Invitation pending, either:

  • click Email the invite to send a new link, or
  • copy the link shown there and send it yourself. It works once and expires after 3 days; reload the page for a fresh one.

If no link is shown (they were also invited to another firm), email them the invite.

Their first sign-in

The link opens Welcome to Firmdesk, where they choose a password and click Set password and sign in. Firmdesk then offers two-factor sign-in. Owners and admins must set it up, and so must everyone when your firm requires it; others can choose Not now. They then land on Your workspaces and click Enter.

Until they have work, My work shows Nothing on your list yet, with links to Deadlines, Clients, their timesheet and their settings.

Who can do what

Every client's page, documents and requests are open to the whole team. Each level adds to the ones above it.

Level Who Adds
Team Everyone Today, My work, Deadlines, Clients, Contacts, Documents, Requests, Reminders, Emails sent, the Team list, their own tasks and time
Reviewer Seniors, managers, partners, admins, owners Sharing documents with clients when Only reviewers can share is on in the portal settings
Manager Managers, partners, admins, owners Everyone's tasks and time, approving timesheets, billing, invoices and payments, sending a request or portal invites to many clients at once
Admin Admins and owners Settings, the team, importing clients, setting up services for many clients at once, exports, the activity log, deleting a client
Owner Owners Making other owners, deleting the workspace

A member's title sets their level. Owners and admins have every level up to theirs, whatever their title.

Change someone's access or title

  1. Go to Team, open the person and click Edit.
  2. Change their Access, Title or any other detail.
  3. Click Save.

A new Billing rate also goes on their unbilled time that has no rate. Tick Use this rate for all their unbilled time to change all of it; billed time never changes. To keep someone out of the workspace without removing them, untick Active.

Remove someone

On their page, open More actions (⋯), choose Remove from the firm and confirm. They're taken off the clients and tasks they were assigned to. Their login stays, in case they belong to other firms.

Owners are protected

  • Only an owner can make someone an owner, change or remove an owner, or reset an owner's two-factor sign-in when they lose their phone. Admins can't.
  • A workspace always keeps one active owner. To step down, make someone else an owner first.

Work in several firms

One login can belong to several firms. After you sign in, Your workspaces lists yours: click Enter on one. To switch, click your firm's name at the top of the sidebar and choose another under Switch workspace. Your name, password and two-factor sign-in are the same in every firm; each firm sets your access and title. So if you lose your phone and have no recovery codes, Firmdesk support resets your two-factor rather than one of your firms: see When someone loses their phone.

Good to know

  • Only owners and admins add, change or remove people.
  • The Administrative title isn't Admin access: it gives the Team level.
  • Team changes are recorded in Settings › Activity.
  • A member's email and phone show in the portal of the clients they're assigned to, when Their team at the firm is on in the portal settings.
  • You can't invite people into a sample firm.