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Administering Oracle CRM On Demand > User Management and Access Controls > Book Management > About Record Ownership Modes

About Record Ownership Modes

Depending on your company's business needs, you might not want to assign owners to records of a certain record type. Instead, you might want to organize your records in such a way that you do not need to reassign ownership of records when employees move to other responsibilities, or when sales teams are realigned because business models change. Starting with Release 20, Oracle CRM On Demand allows you to support such business needs by associating a primary custom book with a record instead of assigning an owner to the record. Any user who is a member of the primary custom book on a record can access and work with that record, as long as the user's role and access profile settings give the user the necessary access rights. Your company might also want to set up some record types so that records of that type are not required to have either an assigned owner or an associated primary custom book.

Oracle CRM On Demand allows you to set up the following modes of record ownership for most of the record types that use books:

• User mode. User mode is similar to record ownership in Release 19 and earlier releases of Oracle CRM On Demand. When a record type is configured in user mode, each record of that record type must have an owner assigned to it. If the Book field is available on the detail page of the record, then the Book field displays the user book associated with the owner.

  NOTE: Service request records can exist without an owner by default, and some record types such as Users and Products do not have owners on the records. This functionality is unchanged from earlier releases of Oracle CRM On Demand.

• Book mode. When a record type is configured in book mode, the records of that record type cannot have an owner assigned to them. Instead, a primary custom book is required for each record. Any user who is a member of the primary book on a record has access to and can work with the record, as long as the user's role and access profile settings give the user the necessary access rights. You can use book mode only with record types that support books.
• Mixed mode. Mixed mode is also referred to as user or book mode. When a record type is configured in this mode, a record of that record type can be set up in any one of the following ways:
  • The record can exist without either an assigned owner or an associated primary custom book. Users can access such a record through team membership or membership of a book associated with the record. Users whose user role has the Can Read All Records check box selected in Step 2 of the Role Management wizard can also access the record.
  • The record can have an owner assigned to it.
  • The record can have a primary custom book associated with it.

    NOTE: The record cannot have both an assigned owner and a primary custom book.

    You can use mixed mode only with record types that support books.

NOTE: You must use the user mode of record ownership for the Sample Transaction record type, because every sample transaction must be related to an inventory period for a specific user. Do not configure book mode or mixed mode for the Sample Transaction record type.

Regardless of the ownership mode that you configure for a record type, users can assign additional books to a record, and users can link additional users to a record if the record type supports teams. A user who is a member of any book that is assigned to a record can access the record and can work with the record, as long as the user's role and access profile settings give the user the necessary access rights.

Reporting

For the Account and Contact record types, you can create real-time and historical reports based on the relationship between the records and the primary book on the records. For more information about reporting and record ownership modes, see About Visibility to Records in Analytics.

Record ownership modes do not impact the data-visibility rules that apply when you select a book in the Book selector in Analytics. For more information about the data-visibility rules for books in reporting, see About Designing Book Structures.

Record Types That Support Record Ownership Modes

Record ownership modes are supported for record types that support custom books, with the following exceptions:

• Allocation
• Fund
• Inventory Audit Report
• Inventory Period
• Messaging Plan
• Smart Call
• Solution

You can configure all of the other record types that support custom books in user mode, book mode, or mixed mode. You can use a mixture of ownership modes for the various record types that support books. For example, you can configure the Contact record type in book mode, and configure the Account record type in user mode. You can change the record ownership mode for a record type at any time. You configure the record ownership mode for a record type by configuring the Owner and Book fields on the record type as required or not required, as shown in the following table.

NOTE: The page layouts for the record type must be set up correctly for the record ownership mode. For more information, see About Field Setup and Page Layouts for Record Ownership Modes.

Default Record Ownership Mode

For existing companies that were created in Release 19 or earlier releases of Oracle CRM On Demand, user mode is the default record ownership mode except for the Service Request record type, which is configured in mixed mode by default. For new companies, mixed mode is the default record ownership mode for the record types that support record ownership modes.

Default Values in Owner and Book Fields

When a user opens a New record page, the values in the Owner and Book fields are as follows:

• If the record type is configured in user mode, then the Owner field is automatically populated with the alias of the current user. The Book field, if it is present, is automatically populated with the name of the user book for the current user.
• If the record type is configured in mixed mode, then neither the Owner field nor the Book field is populated.

  NOTE: Appointments that users create through their calendar are an exception to the normal behavior for record ownership modes. When a user creates an appointment through the user's calendar, the Owner field is populated with the name of the current user, regardless of the record ownership mode.

• If the record type is configured in book mode, then the following happens:
  • The Owner field on the new record is not populated.
  • For the Book field, the default value depends on the default book that is specified for the record type on the current user’s user record, as follows:
    • If a custom book is specified as the default book for the record type, then the Book field on the new record is automatically populated with the name of the specified default book.
    • If a default book is not specified for the record type, or if a user book or the All book is specified as the default book for the record type, then the Book field is not populated on the new record.

      For information about setting up default books by record type for a user, see Setting Up Default Books by Record Type for a User.

NOTE: If the Owner field is required on a page layout, and if the record type is in mixed mode, then the Owner field is blank by default when a user opens a New record page that uses that page layout. For more information about the field setup and page layouts for record ownership modes, see About Field Setup and Page Layouts for Record Ownership Modes.

Considerations for Record Ownership Modes

When configuring the record ownership mode for a record type, consider the following:

• Assignment manager. The assignment manager can reassign records only to users. It can reassign records only if the record type is configured in the user mode or mixed mode of record ownership. If there is a primary custom book assigned to the record before the assignment manager reassigns the record to an owner, then the assignment manager removes the primary book from the record. The assignment manager cannot reassign records if the record type is configured in book mode. If you configure a record type in book mode, then it is strongly recommended that you make all rule groups for that record type inactive. For more information about assignment rules, see About Assignment Rules.
• Working with other applications. The following applications require records to have an owner. You cannot use these applications if the record type that the application works with is configured in book mode, and if the record type is configured in mixed mode, then the records must have owners:
  • Oracle Outlook Email Integration On Demand
  • Oracle Notes Email Integration On Demand
  • Oracle CRM On Demand Integration for Office
  • Oracle CRM On Demand Connected Mobile Sales
• Updating records after changing ownership mode. If you change the record ownership mode for a record type to user mode, consider updating all of the records of that type to have an owner. Otherwise, the user who next updates a record of that record type will be forced to select an owner for the record. Similarly, if you change the record ownership mode for a record type to book mode, consider updating all of the records of that type to have an appropriate primary custom book assigned to them. Otherwise, the user who next updates a record of that record type will be forced to select a primary custom book for the record.

What Happens When You Change the Record Ownership Mode for a Record Type?

If your company changes the record ownership mode for a record type from one mode to another mode, then the new ownership mode is enforced for any new records of that record type. For existing records, the behavior is as follows:

• When the new record ownership mode is user mode. The following happens when a record is updated for the first time after the ownership mode changes:
  • If the record does not already have a user assigned as the owner, then the user who updates the record is required to select a user in the Owner field.
  • If the record previously had a primary custom book associated with it, then the name of the primary book is cleared from the Book field, and the name of the user book for the new owner is shown in the Book field. The book is also removed from the record and no longer appears in the Books section of the record Detail page.
• When the new record ownership mode is book mode. The following happens when a record is updated for the first time after the ownership mode is changed:
  • If the record does not already have a primary book associated with it, then the user who updates the record is required to select a primary custom book in the Book field.
  • If the record previously had an assigned owner, then the following happens:
    • The Owner field is cleared on the record.
    • If the record type supports teams, then all of the members of the team, except the former owner of the record, remain as members of the team. The behavior is the same for team members who are members of a predefined group; that is, all of the members of the group, except the former owner of the record, remain as members of the team. However, the Account record type is an exception to this rule. If the former owner of an account is a member of a predefined group, then all of the members of the group are removed from the team. Any team members who are not members of the predefined group remain as members of the team, as is the case with other record types.

      NOTE: In the standard application, the former owner of the record is not retained as a member of the team, as described here. However, your administrator can configure the record type so that the former owner of the record is retained as a member of the team on the record. For information about configuring a record type to retain the former owner as a member of the team, see Customizing Previous Ownership for Shared Records.

• When the new record ownership mode is mixed mode. The following happens when a record is updated for the first time after the ownership mode is changed. This behavior also applies each time the record is updated while the record type is in mixed mode:
  • The user who updates the record is not required to select an owner or primary book.
  • The user who updates the record can select an owner or a primary custom book for the record but not both.
  • If a user assigns an owner to a record, and a primary custom book was previously associated with the record, then the Book field is cleared on the record. The book is also removed from the record and no longer appears in the Books section of the record Detail page.
  • If a user associates a custom book as a primary book on the record, and the record previously had an assigned owner, then the following happens:
    • The Owner field is cleared on the record.
    • If the record type supports teams, then all of the members of the team, except the former owner of the record, remain as members of the team. The behavior is the same for team members who are members of a predefined group; that is, all of the members of the group, except the former owner of the record, remain as members of the team. However, the Account record type is an exception to this rule. If the former owner of an account is a member of a predefined group, then all of the members of the group are removed from the record. Any team members who are not members of the predefined group remain as members of the team, as is the case with other record types.

What Happens If Records Are Updated Through The Mass Update Functionality?

The Mass Update functionality, which is supported for certain record types only, allows users to update fields in group of records from list pages. When a user uses the Mass Update functionality to update a group of records, the user is not forced to provide values for any required fields that are null on the records. Therefore, if a user updates a group of records after the record ownership mode for the record type is changed, then the user is not forced to select an owner or a primary custom book on the records that the user updates, even if the new record ownership mode requires the records to have an owner or a primary custom book.