Understanding Teams (for users at large)

Introduction

This article provides a deeper understanding of the Teams view and further explains its elements, including Role, Chart, and Team and how they function.

Chart Admins and Category Admins can learn more about editing in the Teams view here.

1. Teams view mode

Teams is the default view mode in Teams view. You can change this to Extended view mode by toggling the View setting, top right. The Teams view mode shows a single Team (defined as a card and all the cards reporting to it) together with how that Team reports into the overall Chart structure.

Clicking on any card will move it into the centric position, allowing you to navigate around the Chart's structure.

2. Extended view mode

You can get a bird's-eye view of your organization's structure in Extended view mode. When viewing a Chart you get to Extended view mode by toggling the View setting on the far right of the Action Bar. You can then adjust how many levels to show (up to a maximum of three) and zoom and pan around the Chart to see a detailed view of it's structure.

If you click on a card, it will move to the centric (focus) position, allowing you to look at parts of the structure in more detail.

Note: To use actions like "Team Profile" you need to be in regular Team View. These do not appear in Extended View because you are viewing multiple Teams at once.

3. Reports-to relationships

There are two types of reports-to relationships in the Teams view.

Primary relationships are solid lines that show direct reports-to relationships.
Secondary relationships are dotted lines, and are used to show people who report to more than one person. They are used to depict matrixed organization structures.

In the above example, Aliah reports on a primary (solid line) basis to Vitaly, but is on a secondary (dotted line) reports-to basis to the COO, Justine.

4. Collaborators

The third type of relationship in Teams view are Collaborators, which are associated with a Team. These can be used to depict staff positions, assistants, mentors, consultants, board members, advisers, and so on. In the example below, Scott who is a Publisher, is a resource for the Designers Team.

5. Types of Roles

Each node in Teams is a Role, which can be vacant or filled with a person. The structure is created by the relationships between the Roles in the Chart. A Chart is a single, coherent hierarchy of Roles, with each Role having a single reports-to relationship up.

6. Team Cards

Team Cards can also occupy nodes in the Chart structures. Team Cards are most often used to represent a self-managed Team that does not have a leader.

A Chart comprising a single self-managed team is a flat team (a group of people working cooperatively together without any hierarchy). These are useful for creating interest groups or "distribution lists" and then publishing content to them.

Team Cards can also be used to label a group of employees with similar Roles under a person that has a large team. However, Sub-Teams are normally a better way to do this.

7. Sub-Teams and organizing Roles on a Team

Chart Admins can set the order that Roles appear on a Team and organize these into Sub-Teams. These are particularly useful for large Teams that have multiple people in the same job function. Note that content cannot be targeted to a Sub-Team, but you can add to a Team that has a Team Card at the top.

8. Communities of practice

Charts can also comprise a hierarchy of Team Cards that creates a "community of practice". For example, you can have a community for Software Development by using Team Cards in a hierarchy like this:

Community-of-practice structures are useful to capture where interests, knowledge, or skills arrive. These can be controlled by the Chart Admin according to people's formal qualifications, or they can use the Add Yourself feature to allow people to declare their own interests and skills.

9. Teams Categories

System Admins manage the Categories that appear in Teams view. Out-of-the-box, Teams view presents these three default Teams Categories: Main Organization, Working Groups, and Committees and Clubs, all of which can be modified to reflect the nature of your organization by a System Admin.

Main Org Category

The Main Organization Category can only hold a single Chart. Note that like anyTeams Category, Main Org can be renamed. System Admins can identify it by the fact that it does not show a + button when you place your cursor over the Category name.

If your organization does not use a main hierarchy (or you need time to sort out what your main structure actually is before you launch your platform), Main Org can be hidden by a System Admin: Learn how to hide the Main Org Category.

10. Chart i-menu

In the Left Navigation panel in Teams view, the top line for each Chart is its Chart Name. If you click on this Chart Name, an "i-icon" will appear. Hover over i-icon to view an i-panel that provides the Chart's Description and identifies the Chart Admins who are responsible for keeping this Chart up to date.

11. Add Yourself

Charts can be configured such that anybody can add/remove themselves to/from any Team. When this feature is enabled, you will see Add Yourself in the Action Bar.

Clicking on this will add you to the Team currently in view. After clicking, you will see an alert where you enter the Role (function) you'll have on this Team and then click Add Yourself.

Later, if you want to remove yourself from this Team, just click Remove Yourself.