a MUST-HAVE for small/flat organizations: Layout Type-based data sharing rules

a MUST-HAVE for small/flat organizations: Layout Type-based data sharing rules

TL;DR
  • zoho's role-based data sharing rules are pointless if you are a very flat or small organization (like mine <15 ppl) - team members wear many hats and own records across multiple record/layout "types"
  • recommendation - add data-sharing rules or permission sets (a la salesforce-style) where data sharing/access is permitted based on a record/layout type in addition to role/hierarchy.
here's the use case:
  1. Company has 10 employees
    1. One founder
    2. One VP that manages A, B, & C functions of the business
    3. Multiple team members that operate each of the A, B, C functions
    4. We're a very flat organization so roles/hierarchical rules don't work for us
  2. Requirement:
    1. Role VP owns accounts where Layout Type = A, B or C
    2. Role VP needs to share accounts to three different employees:
      1. Employee 1 can only see accounts where account Layout Type = A
      2. Employee 2 can only see accounts where account Layout Type = A & B
      3. Employee 3 can only see accounts where account Layout Type = C
  3. Problem with current Zoho Data Sharing rules:
    1. If I create a data-sharing rule where VP role shares contacts with subordinates, all employees get accounts for all Layout Types A, B & C
      1. We can try to "hack around" this issue by training all employees and the VP to do the following: when you create a new account type = A, be sure to assign it to Employee 1, when account type = B, be sure to assign it to Employee B, so on and so forth. This is not scalable and it is very prone to human error and unfortunate leakage of sensitive data to which some employees should not have access.
      2. For instance, we simply cannot have Investor or Attorney Accounts/Contacts shared across all employees as those are very sensitive.
    2. Layout Type permissions under Security Control > Profiles only limits the creation and filtering of a Layout Type 1. Even if a Profile is limited to Layout Type 1, CRM still allows these Profile users to view and edit records with other Layout Types other than Layout Type 1
  4. User Story - Recommended Solution:
    1. As a Zoho CRM Administrator, I would like the ability to not only create role-based data-sharing rules, but also Layout Type data-sharing rules so I can have more granular control over how Roles can share subsets or segments of records within a single module to other roles, groups or users within my organization.
    2. For example in the use case I mentioned above, I would like to create the following:
      1. Role VP, Role A, Role B, Role C
      2. Data Sharing Rules
        1. Accounts From Role VP to Role A when Account Layout Type = A
        2. Accounts From Role VP to Role B when Account Layout Type = A or B
        3. Accounts From Role VP to Role C when Account Layout Type = C
    3. Voila! We just created Layout Type-based data sharing rules