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Microsoft Dynamics CRM Settings and Administration

  • Article

Microsoft Dynamics CRM enables administrators to configure many settings and configuration options to better meet the needs of the environment. Using Microsoft Dynamics CRM, administrators can perform a number of the administrative tasks, including the following: 

  • Sales Quota Management
  • Fiscal Year Settings
  • Security Roles
  • System Settings
    • Marketing Configuration
    • Tracking Token Configuration
    • Offline Data Synchronization
  • Auto-Numbering
  • Manage users

Administrators can also configure deployment-wide settings such as the following:

  • Deployment Administrators
  • License Management
  • Internet-facing Configuration

Business Management 

Administrators can visit the Settings and Administration area of Microsoft Dynamics CRM and manage many components of the environment. Some of these include the following: 

 

Setting

Definition

Fiscal Year

Settings

Administrators can set the start date, template and display options for the fiscal year. Compared to earlier to previous versions of Microsoft Dynamics CRM, the fiscal year settings are used more extensively in Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 especially in the Goal Management functionality.

Salespeople

with Quotas

This functionality is available only after the fiscal year settings are set. However, with the addition of the Goal Management functionality, standard Microsoft Dynamics Sales Quota Management functionality is depreciated in this version.

Currencies

Administrators can create and manage currency information within the Microsoft Dynamics CRM environment. In addition, Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 enables administrators to create custom currencies.

Connection

Roles

Administrators can create and manage the connection categories used in the Connection entity.

Relationship

Roles

Relationship roles resemble Connection Roles. Both categorize the link between two records. However, with the inclusion of Connections in Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011, Relationship Roles are depreciated.

Goal Metrics

Administrators can establish the kind of goals their organization tracks.

Be aware that the Relationship Roles and Salespeople with Quotas administrative features will be depreciated in this version. If users are currently using this functionality in Microsoft Dynamics CRM, this shift in functionality must be considered when they upgrade.

Administration

In the Administration area under Settings, administrative users can configure and set many settings. These settings include the following:

 

Definition

Description

Business Units

Administrators can create and manage the organization's business unit structure. Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 lets administrators rename business units and delete them. Deleting a business unit will delete the selected business units and all records owned by these business units, except for users, teams, and child business units.

System Settings

Administrators can manage lots of settings which affect organization-wide user experience. This is covered in more detail in a later section.

Security Roles

Administrators can create and manage security roles. Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 has over five hundred new features and improvements. Therefore, the security roles have a large number of new items which require security consideration. In addition, by using role-based forms and field-level security, administrators have more components which can affect security as well as user experience. This provides greater flexibility for administrators and customizers.

Field Security

Profiles

Administrators can create and manage groups of users and teams that have access to particular attributes marked as requiring field-level security. Administrators can select to allow users in a particular group for a particular attribute the ability to read, update, or enter data into a field.

Teams

Teams are used to group users together. A user can belong to any number of teams. In Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011, teams can own records. This new feature provides more solution flexibility for many customers. Additionally, teams can be deleted if no longer be used and can be assigned security roles.

Users

Administrators can create and manage user records. This is covered in more detail in a later section.

System Settings

Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 allows administrators more control over various system-wide settings. The new configurable settings including the following:

 

Definition

Description

Show Get Started panes on all lists for all users

Select whether to display the Get Started pane.

Set the IM presence option

Select whether instant messaging will display the current status for users, contacts, opportunities, or leads.

Maximum Duration of an Appointment

Select the maximum number of days an appointment can be scheduled for.

Auditing

Let’s administrators set the following options:

  • Start Auditing
  • Common Entities
  • Sales force Automation Entities
  • Marketing Automation Entities
  • Customer Service Entities

Configure E-Mail Processing

Let’s administrators set the following options:

  1. Process e-mail messages only for approved users
  2. Process e-mail messages only for approved queues

Displaying the Get the

Outlook client in the user Message Bar

Allows control over the Get the Outlook Client button to appear on the message bar of the browser client.

Goal Management Roll-up Expiration Time and Frequency Options

Allows control over how long goal roll-up will continue after the end date of the goal. Administrators can also control how frequently the roll-up occurs.

User Management

Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 allows similar control over user records as in earlier versions. However, there are several additional items which can now be managed from the user record such as the following: 

  • License Type
    • Full
    • Limited
    • Device Full
    • Device Limited
  • Default Queue
  • Approve/Reject E-Mail

Also, when you add users in bulk, administrators can set the e-mail processing options when they run the Multiple User Wizard. Another new feature in Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 user management is the ability to delete a user from the application. Although this should be used with caution, administrators have this flexibility.

Data Management

Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 enables administrators to manage the data as they have become accustomed to in earlier versions. In addition to these existing features, Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 lets administrators to quickly add or remove sample data as well as download templates for data import into Microsoft Dynamics CRM.

Specifically, Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 controls the following areas of data management:

 

Definition

Description

Duplicate Detection

Settings

Allows administrators control of the following aspects of duplicate detection in their organization:

  • Enabling/Disabling Duplication Detection
  • Detecting Duplicates
  • When a record is created or updated
  • When a user goes from offline to online
  • During data import

Duplicate Detection

Rules

Let’s administrators create, modify, unpublish, and publish detection rules.

Duplicate Detection

Jobs

Let’s administrators create and monitor duplication detection jobs.

Bulk Record Deletion

Let’s administrators create and monitor bulk deletion jobs. The Bulk Record Deletion Wizard lets administrators delete selected records from particular entities in Microsoft Dynamics CRM by defining the criteria for deletion and the frequency of the deletion process.

Data Maps

Let’s administrators create, import, and export maps used for data import.

Imports

Let’s administrators monitor imports that are in process or were imported.

Template for

Data Import

Let’s administrators quickly produce a template for use in Microsoft® Office Excel®. This template can be populated with source data and later imported into Microsoft Dynamics CRM.

Sample Data

Let’s administrators add and delete sample data into their system.

Document Management

Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 has a direct integration with Microsoft® SharePoint®. Through this integration users can manage SharePoint documents through a contextual interface. In other words, users can store documents about a particular account in SharePoint and subsequently navigate to an account, for example, and see those documents within that record in Microsoft Dynamics CRM.

SharePoint integration with Microsoft Dynamics CRM enables you to do the following: 

  • Create, upload, view, and delete documents on a SharePoint server from Microsoft Dynamics CRM.
  • Use SharePoint document management abilities within Microsoft

Dynamics CRM such as check in and check-out of the document, view version history, and change the properties of the document. SharePoint integration is enabled for individual entities in Microsoft Dynamics CRM. These default entities include the following: 

  • Account
  • Knowledgebase Article
  • Lead
  • Opportunity
  • Product
  • Quote
  • Sales Literature

To enable SharePoint integration or document management for an entity, set the document management status to Enabled. Similarly, to disable document management for an entity, set the property to Disable.

When enabling SharePoint integration for an entity, a Documents link under the Common group in the left navigation pane is added for all entity records in the Microsoft Dynamics CRM Web application. Use the Documents link to create or manage SharePoint location records for the entity record.

Audit Management

Global Audit Settings

Within the System Settings, administrators can set the following items:

 

Name

Description

Start Auditing

To enable auditing functionality across an organization, this option must be selected.

Common Entities: Sales, Service, Marketing

If Start Auditing is set to True, these options are enabled and available for selection.

Audit Summary View

By default, the Audit Summary View shows a user the following attributes: 

  • Changed date
  • Action
  • Change by
  • Record (this links to the record updated)
  • Entity
  • Operation

When it is opened, the audit record displays a list of the audited fields for that particular entity together with the new and old values for each. Audit summaries can also be viewed on the record level.

***Audit Log Management ***

Over time, the audit logs can become large and potentially outdated. From the Audit Log Management view, an administrator can delete the audit log.