Opportunity Assignment to Owners and Workgroups: General Information

MYOB Advanced provides you with flexible tools for distributing the customer management workload within the company. You can use assignment maps to indicate to the system how to assign opportunities to individuals or groups of people (that is, to owners or workgroups). This topic provides information about assigning opportunities to owners and workgroups one by one or through mass processing.

Learning Objectives

In this chapter, you will learn how to do the following:

• For an opportunity class, specify how the system determines the default owner it assigns to new opportunities of the class
• Assign an opportunity manually to a particular owner
• Assign a selected group of opportunities to owners or workgroups by using an opportunity assignment map

Applicable Scenarios

You may want to learn how to assign opportunities to owners and workgroups in scenarios that include the following:

• You need to have the system automatically assign opportunities to salespersons when leads are converted to opportunities.
• You need to manually assign or reassign an opportunity to another owner or workgroup.
• You do not work with leads in your system and need to assign opportunities to the appropriate owners, workgroups, or both without lead conversion.

Assignment of Opportunities to Owners and Workgroups in MYOB Advanced

In MYOB Advanced, you can easily base the rules for opportunity assignment on company policies because opportunities can be assigned to owners or workgroups in many different ways, based on the settings and attributes of the opportunity records being assigned. You can assign opportunities manually or automatically, through conversion of a lead to an opportunity.

You can automatically assign an opportunity to an owner by converting a lead to an opportunity if a default owner has been selected in the associated opportunity class.

You can manually assign an individual opportunity to an owner or workgroup. When you create or edit an opportunity on the Opportunities (CR304000) form, you can select an owner in the Owner box of the Summary area. To assign an opportunity to a workgroup, you select a workgroup in the Workgroup box (on the CRM Info tab of the Opportunities form) and then select the owner in the Owner box. The list of owners available for selection is narrowed to only owners from the selected workgroup.

You can assign groups of opportunities that do not have owners specified by using the Assign Opportunities (CR503110) mass-processing form. On this form, you can assign selected opportunities or all opportunities that do not have owners, and the system uses the opportunity assignment map specified on the Customer Management Preferences (CR101000) form to determine the owners of the opportunities.

You can cause the system to automatically assign opportunities to owners by specifying a setting for each opportunity class that determines how the default owner is assigned to new opportunities of the class. On the Details tab of the Opportunity Classes (CR209000) form for the opportunity class, you select one of the predefined options in the Default Owner box, and the system specifies the default owner of a new opportunity of the class in the Owner box of the Opportunities (CR304000) form.

If you want the system to distribute opportunities between owners and workgroups automatically by using an assignment map, you must perform two preliminary tasks.

1. Create a company tree on the Company Tree (EP204061) form to be able to assign opportunity to workgroups or to owners in these workgroups.
2. Create the needed maps for the automatic assignment of opportunities by using the Assignment Maps (EP205010) form. You will use an organizational chart from the company tree in the assignment map. For detailed instructions on configuring assignment maps, see Configuring Assignment Maps

You can manually change the owner of an opportunity that has been manually or automatically assigned in one of the following ways:

• If an opportunity is not assigned to any workgroup, you can select a new owner in the Owner box from the list of all employees.
• If an opportunity is assigned to a workgroup, you can select a new owner in the Owner box from the list of employees that are included in the workgroup; alternatively, you can change the workgroup and select an owner from the newly selected workgroup.

Assignment of Opportunities by Using Opportunity Classes

As noted previously, when you create or modify an opportunity class on the Opportunity Classes (CR209000) form, you can specify how the system automatically assigns the owner to newly created opportunities of the class by selecting the appropriate option in the Default Owner box on the Details tab (Data Entry Settings section). Based on the selected option for the opportunity class, when this opportunity class has been selected for an opportunity in the Class ID box (Summary area) of the Opportunities (CR304000) form, the system determines the default owner of this opportunity and inserts the appropriate employee name in the Owner box in the Summary area of the form.

In the Default Owner box of the Opportunity Classes form, you select one of the following options for the opportunity class:

• Do Not Change: If the owner has been specified in the Owner box of the Opportunities form for the opportunity, and you change the opportunity class in the Class ID box of the Summary area, the system does not clear or change the owner for this opportunity. If no owner has been specified for the opportunity, the system leaves the Owner box blank.
• Creator: When an opportunity of the class is created, the user who created the opportunity record is assigned as its owner by default.
• Assignment Map: When an opportunity of the class is created, based on the assignment map (which you must also select in the Assignment Map box for the class), the system determines the default owner or workgroup (or both) and inserts them on the Opportunities form for the new opportunity. The system inserts the workgroup of the opportunity, if applicable, on the CRM Info tab. If you are assigning opportunities based on assignment maps, you can use a different assignment map for each opportunity class, if needed.
• From Source Entity: When an opportunity of the class is created, if it is created from another entity—such as a lead, contact, or business account—the opportunity inherits the owner and workgroup (if specified) from this lead, contact or business account. This default owner is assigned if you create an opportunity from a contact on the Contacts (CR302000) form or from a business account on the Business Accounts (CR303000) form.

We recommend assigning opportunities by converting leads to opportunities or, if you manually create opportunities, by using opportunity classes because the system assigns an opportunity to an owner each time a new opportunity record is created.

The Usage of a Company Tree for Assignment

In MYOB Advanced, a company tree is an organizational chart that represents a hierarchical structure of a company with groups that contains a list of people and roles of people within each of the groups. The company tree is used to assign leads, cases, opportunities, business accounts, contacts, or email activities to owners when you want the system to distribute these entities between owners (individuals) and workgroups (groups of people) by using an assignment map on the Assignment Maps (EP205010) form.

On the Company Tree (EP204061) form, you create a hierarchy of workgroups for using them in the assigning process, and you include people or groups of people in the workgroups. You can include the same people in different workgroups. When you create a new entity, such as a new lead, and select a workgroup for it, you can select as an owner only one of the people that you have included in this workgroup in the company tree. We recommend the use of a company tree to speed and streamline your assignments.

Assignment of Opportunities by Using Assignment Maps

You can use the assignment map functionality to assign opportunities between owners automatically through the use of opportunity classes or manually when you mass-assign opportunities.

Once an assignment map for opportunities is created, you can do either or both of the following:

• Specify the assignment map on the Opportunity Classes (CR209000) form for the opportunity class if you have selected Assignment Map in the Default Owner box on the Details tab: Each new opportunity of the class will be assigned to a default owner on the Opportunities (CR304000) form according to this map. A user can change the default owner as needed.
• Specify the assignment map on the Customer Management Preferences (CR101000) form in the Opportunity Assignment Map box of the General tab (Assignment Settings section): Existing opportunities that do not have owners will be assigned to owners based on this map as soon as you have assigned the opportunities by using the Assign Opportunities (CR503110) mass processing form.

Execution Errors Related to Mass-Assignment of Opportunities

If an assignment map contains errors (for example, a workgroup contains an employee who has quit the company and cannot be assigned to any records), and you have processed any opportunities that should be assigned according to this assignment map by using the Assign Opportunities (CR503110) form, the system will list these errors in the Processing dialog box. You can view the error by clicking the More button on the Errors tile. In the Message column, the system displays the text of the error message.

Notifications About Assigning an Opportunity to an Owner

In MYOB Advanced, an administrator can set up email notifications on the Business Events (SM302050) form so that if a user is assigned to a new opportunity, this user receives a notification by email, by SMS, or in the MYOB mobile app. For details, see Business Events.