Top 5 Tips for User Management

From the Admin keynote to the Admin zone, Dreamforce 14 was definitely the year of the Admin. It was so cool to have access to hundreds of Admin experts and sessions designed to make an admin’s life easier.

In one of my DF14 breakouts I shared my top 5 tips for user management, because—let’s face it—we admins spend a lot of time in the User object.
Here’s an abridged version of my presentation:

Don’t let managing users manage you

1. Get Organized with Custom Fields

Personally, I can’t survive without custom fields on my User detail records. Here are some examples of custom fields that I use and how I use them.

• To stay organized:“Admin Notes” and “Deactivation Date”
• For user tracking and communications: “Mobile Device Type” and “App Licenses”
• For workflow automation to send user updates and change fields: “Start Date”
• To personalize email templates: “Signature Block”
• For management reporting: “Cost Center”

2. Replace Profiles with Permission Sets

I love, love, love the new permission set functionality that came out last year. Now I can easily extend functionality to one or more users and not to a whole profile. This is great for granting access to objects, fields, tabs, record types, apex classes and Visualforce pages. I can also use it to give app and system permission like “Edit HTML templates” and “Override forecasts”.

3. Login as any User

This is a must for any admin that has to test and troubleshoot. It lets you see private reports, personal recycle bins, private activities, private list views etc. I also use it to test items out as I’m developing them. Now you can see exactly what your user sees. I also find this is the best way to conduct training and grab screenshots instead of using my admin view.
Just submit a case to Salesforce to enable this feature.

4. Freeze Termed Users

The most dreaded part of user management that makes Admins cringe is when a User terminates unexpectedly. It’s usually an emergency to turn off their access. In the past, you had to cancel everything, get to a computer, reset the username or password and frantically try to update workflow rules.
Now, you can simply click the “Freeze” button on the user record to prevent them from logging in and then take your time to carefully and methodically remove them from workflow rules and email alerts before you deactivate them.

5. Manage Users Anywhere, Anytime

Best of all, you can now manage users right from your phone using the SalesforceA app. This is perfect when users lock themselves out and you’re not near a computer. It also lets you assign permission sets, edit users and view log in history. As a bonus, you can easily access the mobile version of both release notes and the success.salesforce community right from the app.
You can download the SalesforceA app from either the iTunes or the Google Play store.

The Future Looks Bright

These simple tips will end up saving you a lot of time and frustration. As most of these tips are on relatively new features it’s obvious Salesforce has a renewed focus on admins. I simply can’t wait to see what other new admin features Salesforce has planned for upcoming releases.
Here’s hoping this will turn into the “Decade of the Admin”!

About the Author

Susan Thayer is a Consultant with Sogeti, USA, she has been using Salesforce since 2007, is a Salesforce MVP, and Nebraska Salesforce User Group Leader.

Susan is consistently ranked a top 50 contributors to the Salesforce Answers Community. You can follow Susan on twitter at @Susanthayer and read her blog at crmology.com