Permissions within Planner

[CJ Reed]

I had an inquiry from a colleague asking if there is a way to restrict members of a plan to where they can't create buckets or move tasks around in different orders.  I think there is an interest in having some members have read only access to look at the tasks in a plan and others who have access to create buckets and move tasks around.  Is this possible or on the roadmap?

[#2]

@laminblake could you please share with us the whole workaround that you are currently testing?

[#3]

Unfortunately this is not a full solution as anyone with the link can also join the group (without needing owner permission) and then start causing mayhem by deleting, editing, etc. (deliberately or accidently).

[#4]

Do you also want the "User" that submits to also "View" the Planner task that is submitted? MS Forms looks to have some of that functionality though I'm definitely not the expert there. We've been playing with using Forms to create a Planner Task but the person still has to be a member of that Planner. We really need a "View Only" ability within MS-Planner - Plans still

[#5]

It's really bad how Microsoft hadn't implemented this basic feature. I am wondering are there any alternatives ?

[#6]

I was able to use a Form and a Flow to create a task - and it works great, other than a handful of things not being coded for manipulation through Flow.

Now I have an issue where I trained everyone to manually create a task, then later simplified to use the Form... and I have a couple people who just refuse to use the Form.  Their manually created tasks are a mess.

Interestingly, all tasks are now "made" by me when they come from the Form... So I thought I could restrict creation of Tasks to just Channel Owners.  

NOPE.  Why not?  If a post can be created only by an owner, why not a Task?

(Previously, I was irritated that all Tasks now look like I created them - I don't even use the system!  But if this could be used to my advantage, I wouldn't mind so much.)

SO MUCH POTENTIAL with these tools.  But it's discouraging to see basic requests sit for 4 years without change.  

[#7]

I found a way to have the assigned task display in teams to only the user to which that task was assigned to. Teams is the app my team uses. I use the planner to make the task and assign them. The people who use planner will be able to see all the tasks and the people that only use the teams app will only see the assigned tasks. Just found out today and will be testing out to see how it works

[#8]

Okay, so I have found a solution or you may call it a workaround.

Go to https://tasks.office.com/

Create your plan, attach it to your respective team and assign the task.

Ask your teammates to open teams and open an app:

Now they will only be able to see assigned task to them

Regards,

Shameel

[#9]

Agreed. Planner has such potential but just falls short of actually being useful. It needs the ability to handle people inside and outside of an organization, as well as being able to easily grant permissions to plan participants to view, move, edit, delete, and complete tasks. In my opinion it also needs to be linked into outlook so the person assigned to the task can actually reflect 'planned' time to work on whatever the task is and show in their calendar. Then you could get reminders to do the work and updates if it was completed or late. Not to mention track the time associated with actually completing the task.

[#10]

@Claib1 Is the Planner now able to handle giving access to users outside of your Team (in SharePoint or Teams) but within your organization?  I am working on a SharePoint site with a Plan component, but I want to open the Plan to only select people (example: only selected members and also users outside of the Team)?

[#11]

Agreed! But it's been like this since I first discovered it (5+ years ago). TBH I don't see any willingness coming from MS to change anything in Planner - it remains underpowered and just short of useful, it could be so much more with the addition of allowing external users and user controls (who can edit, close, and move tasks).
With the lack of any development in this product, I have got to the point where I expect to see it retired more than developed.

[#12]

My understanding is a Plan is a separate entity (like a Word document), so yes you should be able to add users to a Plan (providing they are within your organisation).
Restricting users is more difficult, so if you want a part of a Team and selected non-Team members, as far as I am aware, the only way to do this would be to add individuals or create a new Group (or Team).

[#13]

Thanks for your reply Simon. Do you have the actual steps how to do this. The user I'm trying to add is part of our organization. I setup the user to have limited edit access of a SharePoint site. The only way I can see him having access to the Plan is to add him as a member, but we do not want to do that. We just want him to have access to a unique Plan and selected components of the SharePoint site.

[#14]

@Simon Goodman I think they have put the functionality into 'Project' which is not included in the standard licenses.  I agree with you that I bet they retire this product and focus on developing Project so they can have another add on fee.

[#15]

I agree, but thinking back, the whole point of Planner was for simple projects where Project is overkill. Also the cost of Project isn't small. Taking cost and complexity together Project is a non-starter for many organisations.
As a simple Kanban planner Planner has a lot going for it, but it all to often falls short through missing simple controls (literally today, I have had three prospective projects fall short because of Planner's lack of controls - none of which would be suitable in any way for Project!).
Sadly retirement and third party planners look to be the way forward for Planner and it's functions.

[#16]

@zakcandao 
Just tested this, here are my steps:
Open your SharePoint site and create your Plan;
From within SharePoint, or from within Planner, open your Plan;
In SharePoint look for Members, in Planner click the number of Members (in the upper right corner);
Add you new Member from the prompt on screen.

Hope this helps

[#17]

@Simon Goodman 

There's also the option to have Separate Plans...... with links to it within the Sharepoint Site/Team/ETC - so you can control those permissions individually if desired.  This creates additional Sharepoint Sites/Office 365 Groups in the Background but isn't too bad as long as you don't get too crazy with it.  If only MS had a native way to turn an Email into a Planner Task...... Now that would be amazing.  I've been using Planner as my daily Shared Task list.

[#18]

Thanks for your reply Simon. That part I understand and able to easily add a member to the SharePoint site and Teams group and be able to view/edit the Plan and the document libraries.

What I'm trying to figure out is a way to add a user who is a member of our organization, but I DO NOT want that user to be a member of the SharePoint site or Teams Group. I would like to limit his edit access to just the Plan and selected document libraries the SharePoint site.

Similar to Managing Access to a document library, where you can define, view or edit access of specific folders.

I hope there is a way to do this with Plans.

[#19]

Is it possible to assign different permissions to individual planners within the same group? @ArekR88 

[#20]

@Nick_V635 At first glance this appears to work.  When users try to make changes they'll get an error.  The issue I've found with is there will be a "Join" button at the top of the page, allowing the user to join the team without the Owner's approval.  Then you're right back to square 1 - They have editing capabilities in the Planner as well as access to the entire team.