How to Create and Manage Teams for Faster Job Allocation

Every agency has its own way of grouping people. You might have a handful of workers who are brilliant with autism clients, a group who only ever pick up weekends, or a set of regulars who know one hospital inside out. Teams are where you record those groupings in Agency Accelerator.

A Team is a named group of workers that you build yourself. Once a Team exists, you can select it when you post a job and the platform filters your workforce for you, suggesting the most suitable people for that shift instead of you searching from scratch every time.

Teams sit under Employees, and each Team is linked to one Branch. Unlike Payroll Entities, a worker can belong to as many Teams as you like, so there is no need to choose between grouping someone by skill and grouping them by site.

Before you begin

At least one Branch must already be set up, as every team has to be assigned to one.
The workers you want to include need a profile on the platform already, so add any new starters first.
Fields marked with an asterisk (*) are required.

If you would like a quick reminder of what teams are for, select What is a Team? in the top right-hand corner of the screen.

What a team does for you

Selecting that link opens a short explanation of what teams are designed to do. It sets out four benefits.

Custom grouping. Create named pools of workers based on skills, preferences or specialities, such as “Autism Specialists” or “Weekend Staff”.
Smart suggestions. When you post a job, simply select a team and your Suggested Workers list is filled with relevant candidates.
Branch specific. Teams are linked to specific branches, so you only ever group and allocate workers within the correct operational area.
Instant allocation. Pre-defining your worker pools removes repetitive searching and gives you one-click visibility of your preferred staff during booking.

Finding your teams

Select Employees in the left-hand menu.
Choose Teams.

The panel on the right-hand side of the screen lists every team you have. Each card shows the team’s initials, its name, how many members it holds and its current status, which will be either ACTIVE or DEACTIVATED.

To find a particular team, type into Search by Team Name, or narrow the list down using Select by Assigned Branch. Select a team’s card to open it.

Creating a new team

From the Teams screen, choose to create a new team. The breadcrumb at the top of the page then reads Teams / Create New Teams and the page is headed Create New Team.
Under Team Information, enter a Team Name. Choose something your colleagues will recognise at a glance, such as a client site, a shift pattern or a specialism.
Choose the branch the team belongs to from Select Branch. This decides which part of your operation the team sits in, so check it before you go any further.
Add a Team Description explaining who the team is for and when it should be used. Colleagues will see this later under View team description.
Move down to Members and add your workers, as described in the next section.
Read the form through once more, then select CREATE TEAM.

Tip: the blue panel on the right-hand side of the screen tells you which part of the form you are working in. Each section header also has a chevron, so you can collapse Team Information or Members and keep the screen tidy while you work.

Please note: every field in Team Information is required, as the asterisks show. If CREATE TEAM does not appear to respond, scroll back up and look for a field you have left empty.

Adding members to your team

The Members section is where you build the team itself.

Type a name or an email address into Search by employee name/email.
Select the worker you want from the results.
Repeat until everyone who belongs in this team is on the list.

Everyone you add appears in the table underneath, which shows their worker name and reference number, for example CW-2025-AA-02725, along with their designation, primary location, agency locations, profile status and an Actions column for removing anyone added by mistake.

Until you add your first person the table simply confirms that there are no members here yet. As soon as you add someone, they appear in the list.

If a worker you expected to see does not come up in the search, there is a help link beside the search box: Can’t see the worker you’re looking for? The usual reasons are that the worker’s profile has not been completed yet, or that they sit under a different branch to the one you have chosen for this team.

Viewing a team

Select a team from the list on the right and the main part of the screen shows everything about it: the team name at the top, a View team description link, the date it was created, a badge showing how many locations the team covers, and a table of every member.

For each member the table shows their worker name and reference number, their designation, their primary location, their agency locations and their profile status.

Profile Status is worth a glance every time you open a team. A worker showing ACTIVE or APPROVED is ready to be allocated work. A worker showing SUBMIT FOR REVIEW is still going through your checks and has not been approved yet, so chase whatever is outstanding before you rely on them for a shift.

Where a worker has no designation or primary location recorded you will see N/A, and where no agency locations are linked you will see No Location(s). These are prompts to tidy up that worker’s profile rather than anything wrong with the team.

Checking the audit log

Two small icons sit at the top of the right-hand panel, just to the left of the search box. The information icon shows the team details and member list, which is the view you land on. The icon below it opens the Audit Log. Whichever view you are in is highlighted in orange.

The audit log is a dated timeline of everything that has happened to the team. Each entry gives the date, the time and a plain-English description, for example that the team was created, and by whom. As members come and go and details are amended, those events build up here, giving you a straightforward record of who changed what and when.

Editing a team

Open the team from the list on the right.
Select the three dots beside the team name.
Choose Edit Team Details.
Amend the name, branch, description or membership as needed, then save your changes.

Please note: if Edit Team Details appears greyed out with a small padlock beside it, your user access level does not allow you to change this team. Ask the main user on your account either to make the change for you or to update your permissions.

Deactivating a team

Deactivate a team when the grouping is no longer needed, for example a contract that has come to an end, a site you no longer staff, or a pool of workers that has been replaced by a better one.

Open the team from the list on the right.
Select the three dots beside the team name.
Choose Deactivate Team.

The team’s status changes from ACTIVE to DEACTIVATED and it will no longer be offered to you when posting a job. Deactivating a team does not delete anybody. Every worker keeps their profile, stays in any other teams they belong to, and remains available for work as normal.

Before you deactivate, it is worth checking that nobody on your team relies on that grouping day to day, and that any workers who should still be grouped somewhere have been added to another team first.

Tip: deactivate rather than leaving unused teams active. A short, current list makes choosing the right team at the point of booking far quicker.

Using your teams when you post a job

All of the effort above pays off at the point of booking. When you post a job, select the relevant team and your Suggested Workers list is populated with the people in it, rather than your entire workforce. You see your preferred staff for that role immediately, which means fewer searches, faster allocation and a much better chance of the shift going to somebody the client already knows.

Good habits worth adopting

Name teams plainly. A colleague covering for you should understand what a team is for from its name alone.
Keep membership current. Add new starters as they join and remove leavers, otherwise your suggestions quietly become out of date.
Use several small teams rather than one large one. A worker can sit in as many teams as you need, so group by skill, by client and by shift pattern if that helps.
Write a proper description. It takes a moment and saves your colleagues guessing.
Review before busy periods. A quick check of your teams before the school holidays or the festive period is time well spent.

If something looks wrong

Most issues are quick to sort out yourself.

A worker will not appear in the search. Check that their profile is complete and active, and that they belong to the branch you have selected for the team.
CREATE TEAM will not respond. A required field is empty. Scroll up through Team Information and complete anything marked with an asterisk.
Edit Team Details is locked. Your access level does not permit editing. Speak to the main user on your account.
A team is missing from the list. Clear Search by Team Name and Select by Assigned Branch, as one of them may still be filtering your view.

If a team shows the wrong number of members, will not save, or appears with a status you did not set, please contact our Support Team with the team name and we will look into it for you.

What to do next

With your teams in place, the natural next step is to put them to work when posting jobs and allocating shifts. It is also worth reviewing how your branches and payroll entities are set up, as the three work alongside each other.

Check out our step-by-step guide to creating and managing your teams: