Save clicks with a personalized workplace
Published: September 8, 2006
Just like your office workplace, your Microsoft Dynamics CRM Workplace is where you do most of your everyday work. Instead of wasting time clicking back and forth between the Sales, Service, or Marketing areas and opening and closing extra windows, you can personalize your Workplace to include the areas of Microsoft Dynamics CRM that you need the most and keep them only a click away.
On This Page
View your Workplace
Your Workplace is the top pane in the Navigation Pane. In the following example, you can see how my Workplace looks in the Web application and Microsoft Dynamics CRM client for Outlook before I personalized it.
In the Set Personal Options dialog box, you can personalize your Workplace by selecting additional groupings of Microsoft Dynamics CRM application pages as they apply to your security role or job function:
| • | Sales. Displays marketing lists, orders, invoices, leads, opportunity, and quotes. |
| • | Marketing. Displays marketing lists, campaigns, and quick campaigns. |
| • | Service. Displays cases, contracts, and the knowledge base. |
| • | Scheduling. Displays the service calendar.
This area might not be available in Microsoft CRM client for Outlook. |
Security roles determine which links are displayed in each area.
In addition, the record types that appear when you click New Record on the Standard toolbar are filtered to the records that are listed in your Workplace.
Personalize your Workplace
1. | Under Workplace, click the Personalize Workplace link.
OR –
Start Outlook with Microsoft CRM client for Outlook. On the CRM menu, click Options. |
2. | In the Set Personal Options dialog box, on the Workplace tab, select the areas you want to display. The Preview pane displays each area and its sub-areas. |
3. | Click OK to save your changes and close the dialog box. |
After you save your changes, the Web application updates immediately. Folders in Microsoft CRM client for Outlook will be updated after you restart Microsoft Outlook. In the following example, I selected all of the areas. You can see how my Workplace is displayed in the Web application and Microsoft CRM client for Outlook.
Save a few more clicks in Microsoft Dynamics CRM client for Outlook
Selecting Workplace areas also configures the Workplace folders for Microsoft Dynamics CRM client for Outlook, though perhaps it doesn’t organize them as nicely. Microsoft Dynamics CRM relies on the Microsoft Office Outlook folder structure to provide the navigation. Quite simply, the alphabetization of the folders doesn’t always yield the most effective organization. This is why the Workplace is at the end of the list of folders.
One way around the Outlook folder structure is to use Outlook Favorite Folders. A few additions here will save you a good deal of clicking and scrolling in the folder list. In the example below, I’ve added Accounts, Contacts, and the Workplace folders to my Favorite Folders list.
| • | To add folders to the Outlook Favorite Folder, right-click a folder in the Microsoft CRM folder, and then select Add to Favorite Folders. |
| • | To reorganize the favorites folders, use a drag-and–drop operation. |
With a few clicks now, you can personalize your Workplace, and save yourself a click or more every time you start a task. You can also use these suggestions to de-clutter your Workplace by removing the number of links and areas it displays.
