What a co-admin is and when to use one: IT admin: What is a co-admin and when to use one.
How to work as a co-admin: IT admin: How to use a co-admin account.
- Introduction
- Use Cases
- How to invite a co-admin
- How to manage pending co-admin invitations
- How to make an existing team member a co-admin
- How to manage co-admins
- Next Steps
Introduction
A co-admin is a second person who manages the cloudHQ setup of your company: the team members, the company backups and sync pairs, the shared labels, the connected cloud accounts. They sign in with their own email address and password, and what they see is the same as what you see: sync pairs, backups and shares, connected cloud accounts, team members, along with the settings of every cloudHQ app. The subscription stays in your hands. Only you can hand out co-admin access, and only you can take it away.
Below you’ll find the steps for inviting a co-admin, what to do about an invitation that hasn’t been accepted yet, how to turn an existing team member into a co-admin, and how to revoke the access or remove a co-admin. You do all of this on the Users page of your cloudHQ dashboard, where the co-admins are listed in the Co-admins section.
Who you can add as a co-admin:
- someone who has no cloudHQ account yet (one gets created when they accept);
- someone who already has a cloudHQ account of their own;
- a member of your team (see How to make an existing team member a co-admin).
Someone who runs a cloudHQ team of their own, or who is already a co-admin on another cloudHQ account, can’t be your co-admin. Like any other team member, a co-admin uses one of the company’s licences.
Use Cases
- Give a colleague full control without sharing your password
Your IT person or office manager handles sync pairs, cloud accounts and team members through their own login. The subscription still belongs to you.
- Hand over the account while you are away
A co-admin can restart sync pairs that have stopped, re-authorize cloud accounts and help team members. What they see of the account is what you see.
- Take the access back at any time
A consultant finishes a project or an employee leaves, and you revoke the co-admin access with one click. That person still has their own cloudHQ account, and the company setup is not visible to them anymore.
How to invite a co-admin
- Open the invite form
Go to the Users page in your cloudHQ dashboard and click Add Users via Invite ». Another way in is the invite form link in the Co-admins section. - Tick “This user is a co-admin” and confirm
Type the email address of the person, then tick This user is a co-admin: they will see and manage your cloudHQ account exactly as you do. A dialog named Invite as co-admin? appears and tells you again what a co-admin is able to do. To go through with it, click Yes, invite as co-admin. Close that dialog any other way and the box goes back to unticked.Once you tick the box, the option Require the invitee to grant you full access to their cloud accounts is gone. That’s because access to the co-admin’s personal cloud accounts is never part of a co-admin invitation.
- Send the invitation
Click Send Invite. The person gets an email with the subject <your email> invited you to be a co-admin of their cloudHQ account. Inside, the email explains what a co-admin can do and gives the link to accept. The invitation is valid for 15 days. - What happens when the invitation is accepted
An email reaches you with the subject <email> is now a co-admin of your cloudHQ account. The person also shows up in the Co-admins section of the Users page, with the links Revoke co-admin and Manage user ». From then on, their login works as your account. They can accept using a different email address than the one you invited (an alias, for example). In that case the list shows (invited as <address>) next to their email address. If the co-admin has switched back to their own account, the list shows (currently working in their own account).
How to manage pending co-admin invitations
The invitation stays in the Co-admins section on the Users page, marked (invitation pending), until the person accepts it.
- Resend Invite » sends the invitation email again. The link inside is the same one as before.
- Delete invite cancels the invitation, and the link in the email no longer works.
- If nobody accepts an invitation within 15 days, it expires and drops off the list. Send a new invitation when the person still needs access.
How to make an existing team member a co-admin
- Open the member’s page
Go to the Users page and click Manage user » beside that team member. - Make the member a co-admin
Now click Make this user a co-admin ». A dialog titled Make this user a co-admin? opens and lists what a co-admin is able to do. Choose Yes, make co-admin. You’ll see the message <email> is now a co-admin: from their next page load on, their login acts as your account, which means it worked. No invitation goes out and no email is sent, so let the member know yourself.
You can’t make someone a co-admin if that person already manages a cloudHQ team of their own. The page will tell you when that’s the case.
How to manage co-admins
Co-admins are yours to manage, and that’s a job only the account admin has. A co-admin can view the list of co-admins, but changing it isn’t possible for them. They also can’t step down from the role or leave the team on their own. To see all the actions, open the Users page and click Manage user » next to the co-admin.
- Revoke co-admin access
In the Co-admins section of the Users page, or on the Manage user page, click Revoke co-admin and confirm the question This user will no longer be a co-admin and stays a member of your team. Are you sure?. That person still belongs to your team and keeps their own cloudHQ account, but their login no longer works as your account. Their own cloud accounts stay private, as revoking gives you no way in. - Remove a co-admin from the team
On the Manage user page, click Remove user from the team. The person is out of your team and no longer has co-admin access, so the licence frees up again. They keep their own cloudHQ account. - Delete a co-admin’s cloudHQ account
On the Manage user page, click Delete user’s cloudHQ account. The person’s own cloudHQ account is gone. Any sync pairs the co-admin made in the company setup belong to the company and remain, and the note Created by co-admin <email> stays on them.
From the Users page you have no way to log into a co-admin’s account, since a co-admin always signs in with their own password.
Next Steps
- IT admin: How to use a co-admin account (pass this along to the person who’ll be your new co-admin)
- IT admin: What is a co-admin and when to use one
- Open the Users page of your cloudHQ dashboard