Getting started as a system administrator

An administrator holds everything a member can do, and in addition configures the agency. That second part is the job: the statuses requests move through, the roles other people hold, the deadlines work is measured against, and the templates used to write to requesters.

Settings changes are immediate

There is no Save button in Settings and no draft state. Each change is written when you make it and takes effect for the entire agency at once.

Treat every change as live. There is no staging area to try something in.

The seven groups in Settings

• User Management. Users, teams, roles, business hours, shifts and statuses.
• Channels. The citizen portal, the request form, outbound email and inbound email.
• Workflows. The request detail rail, statuses, document statuses, priorities, SLA policies and workflow automations.
• Agent Productivity. Email templates, canned responses and the notification matrix.
• Records & Compliance. Document management, topics, redaction rules, media redaction, package delivery and audit logs.
• Integrations. Microsoft Purview eDiscovery and Microsoft 365.
• Account. Branding and agency information.

Screens marked SOON are not yet available.

The safeguard you cannot switch off

At least one role must always keep the ability to manage settings. If a change would leave nobody able to administer the agency, Govflo refuses it.

Without that rule the first such change would lock everyone out permanently, with no way back in from inside the product.

What configuration actually controls

Almost everything a records officer sees is set here rather than fixed by the product. A status that appears on a request appears because someone configured it. The same is true of priorities, teams, the fields on the request form and the wording of every notification email.

That is worth remembering when you read any documentation, including this one: what your officers see may differ from the examples, because your agency set it.

Grant the role conservatively

Because Settings changes take effect immediately and apply to everyone, administrator is not a convenience role. Give people the member role unless they genuinely need to change how the agency operates.