Skip To Content

Manage groups

If you're an administrator of your organization or you have the correct privileges, you can manage groups that members own. For example, you can edit the group details, change who can see and join the group, change the sharing properties, invite members, manage membership requests, change the owner, update a member's role in the group, remove members from a group, and delete the group. You can also invite other members to join the group.

Tip:

It's recommended that you create some groups for members to join that showcase your organization's featured content, basemaps, and templates. This will help users gain an understanding of how content is organized in the portal and how to collaborate with others. For more information, see Site configuration groups.

Edit group properties and settings

To edit the properties and settings of a group owned, managed, or administered by the member, open the group page. Some actions may not be available depending on how the group was created.

  1. Sign in to the portal website and verify that you have privileges to manage member groups.
  2. Click Groups at the top of the site.
  3. Use the tabs, filters, sort options, and search as needed to find the group you want to edit.
  4. Click the name of the group to open its group page and do any of the following:
    • To edit the information of a group, click Edit next to the property you want to edit, make your edits, and click Save to save your changes. You can edit the group name, summary, description, thumbnail, and so on.
    • To change group settings, such as who can find, join, and contribute to the group, or to specify the type of items (for example, maps or layers) displayed by default on the group's Content and Overview tabs, click the Settings tab and update the properties you want to change. You must have the correct privileges to update the status of a private group or define an enterprise group to manage membership.
    • To change the owner of a group, click Change Owner on the Overview tab, select a new group owner, and click Change Owner.
      Note:

      For groups that allow group members to update all items in the group (that is, groups with the item update capability enabled), group ownership can only be transferred if both of the following conditions are true:

      • The member who is transferring ownership of the group is either a default administrator or has the Groups: Reassign ownership administrative privilege.
      • The member to whom group ownership is being transferred is either a default administrator or has the Groups: Create with update capabilities administrative privilege.

      Tip:

      If you need to change ownership of groups and other items in bulk, you can use the TransferOwnership command line tool. For more information, see Managing items.

    • To prevent the group from being accidentally deleted, click the Settings tab and check the box under Delete Protection.
    • To delete the group, click the Settings tab and click Delete Group. In the Delete window, click Delete. This option is not available if Delete Protection is enabled on the group.
      Note:

      If the group is linked to an enterprise group from an enterprise identity store, only the group item is deleted from the portal. The enterprise group is unaffected because it is managed by the identity store.

      If the group is deleted directly from the identity store, the group item is retained in the portal. All group members are removed from the item, except the group owner.

Manage groups for a specific member

As an administrator, you can manage group membership for a specific member in your organization from the member's Groups page.

  1. Sign in to the portal website and verify that you have privileges to manage member groups.
  2. At the top of the site, click Organization and click the Members tab.
  3. Search for the member by name or user name and apply filters as needed.
  4. Click the More options button More options for the member whose groups you want to manage, and click View groups.

    The member's Groups page appears.

  5. Do any of the following:
    • If you see an Invitations link, the member has been invited to join the number of groups indicated by the number next to the link. Click Invitations and, for each group, click Join this group or Decline. Click Close when finished.
    • To add the member to one or more groups in your organization, click Add to Groups, find and select the groups to add the member to, and click Add to Groups.
    • To remove the member from a group, click the Remove Member From Group link for the group and click Remove.
    • To delete a group owned by the member, click the Delete Group link for the group and click Delete.
    • To update the member's role in a group, click the name of the group to open the group page. For more information, see Manage group membership and roles.

Manage group membership and roles

You can remove members from a group and change their group roles from the Members tab of the group page. You can invite members to the group and manage requests to join the group from the Overview tab or the Members tab.Some actions may not be available depending on how the group was created. For example, if the group is linked to an enterprise group from an enterprise identity store, the options to invite users and manage membership requests will not be available.

Tip:

Default administrators can also assign members to groups in bulk through Groups settings.

  1. Sign in to the portal website and verify that you have privileges to manage member groups.
  2. Click Groups at the top of the site.
  3. Use the tabs, filters, sort options, and search as needed to find the group whose properties and settings you want to edit.
  4. Click the name of the group to open its group page and do any of the following:
    • To remove one or more members from a group, click the Members tab, check the boxes beside the members you want to remove, and click Remove Member From Group.
    • To change a member's role in the group, click the Members tab, check the box beside the member whose group role you want to change, and click Update Member's Group Role. From the drop-down menu, select another role and click Update. Group roles include Owner, Group Manager, and Member, and the options available for a user depend on the user's privileges. For example, to be promoted to Group Manager, a member must be a member of the same organization as the group owner and have privileges to create and own groups.
    • To manage requests to join the group, click Membership Requests on the Overview or Members tab and accept or decline each request.
    • To invite other members to join the group, click Invite Users on the Overview or Members tab and select the members you want to invite to the group. You can add users to the group without having to send them invitations that they must accept to become part of the group. To do this, check the Add organization members without requiring confirmation box. Click Send invitations to invite the users to join your group or click Add to group to add members directly.
      Note:

      Invitations are sent as a notification to the selected members; they are not sent as an email. Members see notifications for group invitations when they sign in to the portal. Notifications are listed next to the member's user name in the portal website.