What is a Team Owner?

A Team Owner is a user role that grants management permissions within a specific team. Team Owners can manage team membership, rename teams, and configure team settings whilst also performing all the clinical duties of a standard team member.

CAREFUL has three levels of user permissions:

• Administrator: Manages the entire organisation, creates teams, and has access to all organisation-wide settings
• Team Owner: Manages a specific team — can add/remove members, rename the team, and manage team settings
• Team Member: Standard clinical user who can manage patients within their teams but cannot modify team settings or membership

Team Owners have additional permissions only within their specific teams. If you're a Team Owner of the Emergency Department, you cannot manage members of the General Surgery team unless you're also a Team Owner there.

In addition to all standard team member capabilities (managing patients, creating actions, adding notes), Team Owners can:

Team Management

• Rename the team — update the team name to reflect organisational changes
• Manage handover categories — create and organise handover categories for better patient handover workflows

Member Management

• Add users to the team — invite new users directly to the team or add existing organisation members
• Remove users from the team — remove members who no longer work in this clinical area
• Promote team members to Team Owner — give other trusted members Team Owner permissions
• Demote Team Owners to Team Members — remove Team Owner permissions from other owners (you cannot demote yourself)

Member Administration

• Set team member duty status — mark members as on duty or off duty
• Force handover of patients — take responsibility for all patients assigned to a specific team member (useful when someone leaves unexpectedly)
• Resend or cancel invitations — manage pending user invitations to the team

There are four ways to become a Team Owner:

1. Team creation: When an Administrator creates a new team, they automatically become the first Team Owner
2. Direct invitation: An existing Team Owner or Administrator can invite a new user directly as a Team Owner
3. Promotion: An existing Team Owner or Administrator can promote a current team member to Team Owner
4. Being added as owner: An Administrator can add an existing organisation member to a team with Team Owner permissions

You Cannot Demote Yourself

Team Owners cannot demote themselves to Team Member. This safeguard prevents accidentally removing the last Team Owner from a team, which would leave the team without management capability.

If you need to step down as Team Owner:

1. First promote another team member to Team Owner
2. Ask the new Team Owner to demote you to Team Member

You Cannot Remove Yourself from a Team

Standard Team Owners cannot remove themselves from a team. Only Administrators who are also Team Owners can remove themselves.

Every Team Should Have at Least One Owner

Whilst CAREFUL technically allows demoting the last Team Owner (leaving a team with no owners), this is not recommended. Always ensure at least one Team Owner remains for management continuity.

If a team has no owners, only an Administrator can restore Team Owner permissions by promoting an existing member or adding a new owner.

Team Owners Cannot Create New Teams

Only Administrators can create new teams. If you need a new team, contact your organisation's Administrator.

All organisation members can see who the Team Owners are:

• In the Teams view, Team Owners are indicated in the Members tab
• In the My Organization view, you can see which teams each user owns

• Designate multiple owners: Consider having 2-3 Team Owners per team to ensure continuous management coverage during leave or shift changes
• Match clinical leadership: Team Owners should typically align with clinical leadership roles (senior nurses, consultants, ward managers)
• Review regularly: Periodically review Team Owner assignments to ensure they reflect current team structure
• Coordinate with administrators: Work with your organisation's Administrators for tasks that require broader permissions