How to delegate repetitive tasks without giving too much system access
Administrative tools often require giving employees excessive permissions just to handle routine tasks like updating distribution lists or screening tenants. This forces managers into awkward workarounds or leaves them trapped doing everything themselves while critical maintenance and security tasks get neglected.
What people tried
Every workaround mentioned in the threads below. We haven’t tested any of them — and nobody here is claiming they worked.
- 1staying stuck at a desk instead of checking on properties
- 2constantly putting out fires instead of doing preventive maintenance
- 3Make employees owners of the distribution lists
- 4Use the Exchange admin center directly instead of the main admin portal
- 5Create a custom RBAC role
In their words
Unedited, most upvoted first, each linked to the thread it came from.
“honestly I think I would have them do all the tenant screening stuff, is the most time consuming part and half the time you can tell in first 5 minutes if someone is trouble or not”source ↗
“the assistant could also handle the late rent calls, I hate those so much, people get so defensive and I just want to fix the sink not argue about money”source ↗
“with that time back I would actually do preventive maintenance walks, catch small problems before they become big expensive ones, but right now is always just putting out fires”source ↗
“We have some helpdesk people whose jobs entail updating some standard distribution lists. They currently have the Exchange Administrator role, which is way too much access for these employees.”source ↗
“But when we assign this role to the employees, the Microsoft 365 admin center does not recognize the elevated permissions.”source ↗
“One workaround is to make all these employees owners of the distribution lists, but that is hacky and haphazard.”source ↗
Where this came up
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