PORTFOLIO

Does this sound familiar?

“Hey, I’m trying to log in to the org email and it sent a code to one of your phones – can whoever gets it send it to me?”

“Hello?”

“Anybody?”

“Oh sorry, I’ve been in a meeting! Let me check.”

“Wait, where did it send the code?”

“Your phone? Check the Gmail app, maybe?”

“Ok, found it! XXXXXX”

“It expired…”

Yeah, it’s painful. Trust me, you’re not the only organization operating this way.  

Once you have a handful of staff (paid or volunteer), sharing accounts becomes unruly fast.  Especially when you’re trying to keep your accounts secure by using multifactor authentication.  If this is where you’re at, then it’s probably time to set up some basic systems for email, docs, calendars, and other tools that your organization uses for communication and collaboration. It will save you time, and more importantly, your sanity.

Here’s how I set up a small organization with Google Workspace for Nonprofits, migrated all their data over, and created a system for their tech that would support them in the long run while keeping their data safe and accounts secure.

UXRS is a small, volunteer-led nonprofit with 6 board members and 4 committee members.  The org hosts monthly virtual workshops / seminars on UX topics that are widely attended (500+ attendees per event is common). 

They were using a single personal Gmail account and sharing the password with everyone in the organization.  This included the events manager whose job was to coordinate events, communicate with speakers, etc.

As a 501c3, the organization qualified for a Google Workspace for Nonprofits, which means free access to email, docs and calendars for all members of the organization. 

• Added DNS records to the organization’s domain so Google Workspace could work properly
• Set up Organizational shared drives in Google Drive to store all the org’s documents
• Migrated all the org’s documents to the new  shared drives
• Created email accounts for board and committee members
• Created groups to grant access to shared drives based on role
• Created an organizational calendar for sharing team availability for events and meetings
• Distributed email credentials to board and committee members
• Inventoried all digital accounts used by organization members
• Set up account delegation for digital accounts that allowed it
• Set up 1Password for the remaining organization’s passwords, using Vaults to grant access to certain credentials according to role

• As board members’ terms expired and they left, there was an offboarding checklist to follow to ensure accounts remained secure and accessible for the next board member.
• As new board members onboarded they had access to the historical information in their email account along with docs in the shared drive. 
• No more sharing passwords or trying to send someone an MFA code before it expired so they could access a shared account
• Each board and committee member had access to shared drives with the documents and other files they needed for their roles.  No more scrambling to share a doc with someone’s personal email in the middle of a board meeting.
• When someone leaves the board, their documents are saved in the shared drive so the organization doesn’t lose anything. 
• When a new board member joins, they get added to the shared drive so they have access to the docs they need right away.

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