How to Manage Workgroups

A workgroup determines the behaviour and semantics of matters in ContactsLaw. It is an invention that happens within the business.

The below guide will explain the ways on how we can manage the workgroups into the system:

1. Getting Started

Navigate to the ribbon group and click on My Business.

Proceed to the pane and click Workgroups.

You will now be able to see the list of current work groups.

Note: Workgroups are hierarchical, and it is additive, not subtractive. That means that any of the parties and fields that are defined in the parent workgroup will be carried through to the child workgroup, and, because of this reason they can't be turned off.

2. Adding New Workgroup

The below guide will explain the key steps in adding new workgroups into the contacts law subscription:

Go to the ribbon group and choose New Workgroup.

Enter the name of the workgroup and tick the box if you want to define the properties of the workgroup straight away.

3. Workgroup Properties

Workgroup Properties has six (6) sections, and those are:

Workgroup

Name: States the name of your created workgroup.

Inherits from: This option is if you want to inherit the workgroup you created from another work group already created.

Matter Types: Composed of three (3) main types of matters namely: Prospect, Client, Administration.

Options:

Manually commence matters: Tick this option if you want to commence the workgroup in earnest with all of the requirements.

Matter Description: This builds on the information that is covered in How to Create Document Templates. This section is used to write content specifications for markers to go in the template.

Members: This is going to be a list of all Members who are associated with the matter in some specific role.

Parties: These are the parties that you add to matter.

Roles: You are only able to select from the roles that define the workgroup.

Client’s role: This is the option which is assigned to the client by default.

Court: This category is for a litigious type of workgroup. For litigious matters, you only have one or two roles and that would be a Judge, case manager or Magistrate.

Fields: This option is to hold the address of a property.

You have the options to add the below.

Field name: Name of the selected field.

Field type: Text, Number, Date/Time, Yes/No.

Formatting: Sentence case, Title case.

Watermark text: Description and/or instructions of what you would like to be watermarked.

Text options: How the text is presented to the user.

Checklist: This is a way of building up a checklist of items that need to be completed during the life of the matter.

4. Insert an Expression

After adding a matter description (Workgroup Properties), the description editor is aware of the new fields that have been created.

Insert an expression where you previously had a placeholder and click {Expression} then Save & Close.

5. Final Steps

The below guide will explain the impact that the workgroup has on creating the matter.

Navigate to the Me tab and select Matters.

Create a New Matter and choose a Workgroup, then click Next.

You should be able to see the parties (Workgroup Properties) that you added to the workgroup. These required parties always show up during matter creation.

After creating a Matter, go back to the Workgroup created, right click and select Open in New Tab.

Proceed to the navigation pane and click Matters. You will see the list of matters created under the workgroup.