Read time: 6 minutes
Summary: Organizations operating on Microsoft 365 have to manage users, mailbox storage, assigned licenses, etc. When the monitoring of the tenant is not centralized, there are chances of data leakage, virus intrusions, service disruptions, and eventually operational immobility. This creates the need to assign admin roles in Office 365, which can take accountability. Before assigning the roles, it is important to find out the different Office 365 administrator roles and responsibilities.
Admin Roles for an Office 365 subscription is assigned to a person who can manage all your organizational communication and collaboration needs, such as email communication, shared storage, instant messaging, intranet sites, etc. It provides centralized control over all the users, mailboxes, and other components of Microsoft, which explains the need to migrate from on-premises Exchange to Office 365.
There are a lot of administrative tasks related to your subscription, users, and configuration settings. You cannot provide every user the access and authority to manage the entire functioning of their accounts, and therefore, needs an administrator in Microsoft 365 for business.
Once you assign, the administrator will then take care of allowing access to the users for specified tasks and other functions to maintain data security. Today, we are going to talk about the different admin roles in Office 365 and what their responsibilities are.
Why Do You Need Admin Roles in Your Organization?
Here’s why you need to assign Office 365 administrator roles and responsibilities:
- Managing User Privileges: Allows the organization to limit user access and permissions. Office 365 admin roles help in reducing the chances of accidental data deletion by providing them access only to perform specific tasks they’re intended to.
- Higher Security: Since Office 365 Global administrators limit users and their access, there’s a reduced risk of compromised credentials.
- User Management: Microsoft 365 administrator roles simplify employee onboarding, offboarding, licensing, and account deactivation for HRs and IT teams.
- Manage Email Rules: Email management experts in the organization are assigned with the Exchange Administrator roles for setting up mail flow rules, anti-spam filters. It prevents unauthorized access and virus intrusions.
- Health Monitoring: Service Support administrators with Microsoft 365 admin roles efficiently monitor system health and manage support tickets and send alerts during outages.
Responsibilities of Office 365 Admins
The Office 365 admin roles and responsibilities are very complex; it requires not only technical knowledge but also professional skills like interpersonal ability, time management skills, customer service aptitude, and man-management skills.
An Office 365 administrator manages Office 365 subscriptions, users, and the configuration to keep everything in order. But it has different admin roles to make the tasks easier and to delegate responsibilities. Admin roles can be assigned according to their knowledge, and you can have multiple administrators with the same role. Let us move to different roles of Office 365 admin.
Different Office 365 Admin Roles
Office 365 admin roles authorize users to perform specific tasks in the Office 365 admin center. However, only the Global administrator has the privileges to assign or modify an admin role. The different admin roles in Office 365 are as follows:
- Global Administrator
A Global Admin has the authority to provide the highest level of permissions to Office 365 accounts. You can have more than one Global Administrator for your Office 365 account, but we recommend that you should have at least two Global Administrators, but you should keep this number as low as possible to avoid any security vulnerabilities.
- Exchange Administrator
An Exchange admin manages mailboxes and Groups using Exchange admin center or Exchange PowerShell. Also, an Exchange Admin monitors service health and manages service requests. This role plays a vital role in Office 365 migration too.
- SharePoint Administrator
SharePoint administrator manages SharePoint data storage and collaborative activities via the SharePoint admin center. A SharePoint administrator can access all the activity reports that are produced in the Office 365 admin center. A SharePoint administrator also performs a vital role in migrating to SharePoint.
- Compliance Administrator
Security and compliance are one of critical aspects of Office 365, and thus, it requires special attention. Compliance Administrator in Office 365 manages security and compliance policies. A Compliance Admin can have access to the Office 365 admin center, Exchange admin center, Azure Active Directory admin portal, and Office 365 Security & Compliance center. He also reviews and manages regulatory compliance, eDiscovery, etc.
- User Administrator
The user management administrator has the authority to execute simple tasks and assist the global administrator. It can add or remove users and groups, assign licenses, reset passwords, and check Office 365 services. However, it cannot remove global administrators, or reset a password for Office 365 admin roles.
- Service Administrator
Service administrators can create support requests related to Office 365 services, including Azure. Service administrators can create support requests related to Office 365 services, including Azure.
- Billing Administrator
Billing admin roles in Office 365 are responsible for managing the Microsoft 365 subscription purchases, service requests, payment requests, etc. They have the authority to supervise service health and buy third-party add-ons.
- License Administrator
The license admin in Office 365 has roles and responsibilities of assigning and unassigning licenses to users and groups, approve/ deny license requests, managing usage location, and monitoring tenant outage using the Service Health Dashboard.
These are some of the administrator roles in Office 365. However, the Global Administrator is a highly privileged role, as it has control over complete Office 365 administration. Looking at all these admin roles, you now have an idea about how complicated it is to manage Office 365 administration.
How to Add an Administrator Using Office 365 Admin Center?
As soon as you create an account and sign up to Microsoft 365 subscription, you’re assigned the role of a Global Administrator. You can add other users on the other administrator roles using the simple steps below:
Step 1: Go to Office 365 admin center, and go to Users, and then select Active users.
Step 2: From the list, select the user to assign the Microsoft 365 administrator roles.
Step 3: Select Manage Roles and define the administrator access you want to assign.
Step 4: Select Save Changes to finalize assigning.
If you don’t want to use the admin center, connect to Microsoft 365 tenant using Microsoft Entra DC admin or a Cloud Application Admin and use PowerShell commands to assign Office 365 admin roles and responsibilities.
Conclusion
Office 365 is a vast platform that comes with multiple features and functionalities, which makes it a bit complex to manage. That is why there are numerous Office 365 administrator roles and responsibilities for managing your Office 365 environment. Office 365 administrators also need to migrate Office 365 mailboxes quite often and there are not much reliable native solutions available. In this scenario, you need to use an expert recommended solution, Kernel Office 365 Migration, that helps with uninterrupted migration between tenants.
Frequently Asked Questions
Ans. Here are the users who should be assigned the admin roles in Microsoft 365 tenants:
1. IT Administrators are given admin rights for effective management of Microsoft services across the organization.
2. Security Admin gets access to implement multi-factor authentication, conditional access control, and fulfill compliance.
3. Support Team uses admin roles to resolve Outlook or Teams errors and reset user password for maintaining security.
4. User Provisioning requires administrator access to create users, assign mailboxes or licenses, and manage groups.
Ans. Follow the steps given below to view M365 admin roles:
1. Open Office 365 admin center and go to Role Assignments.
2. Select a role and click on the Permissions tab.
3. It will show the permissions assigned to user.
4. Now, select Assigned or Assigned admins to add users to admin roles.
