Enterprise CRM: Create a Public Task on a Contact record

What Are Tasks?

Tasks are like a to-do list within CRM. They can be used to assign yourself or other Users to call, email, or meet with Contacts or Organizations that can show up on your Home Tab. They can also be used to record notes or results of a particular interaction once they occur.

Prior to creating a Task you may want to check with your internal business processes to ensure that you are using them in the way that your business unit is intending for them to be used.

What Are My Privacy Options?

Enterprise CRM has records that it shares across all business units and organizations. The Contact record type is one of these public records, although you can create private task on a Contact by using Reserved Contact Data.

While it is likely that most of your Tasks will be private to your business unit there may be times when you want to add a note or other information to share with the wider CRM audience, for example a customer calls with updates to their contact information. You may want to then make a Task that records your call interaction which will help notify other Users that the request to update came from the contact themselves and provide more context for the change. 

If your business unit uses Tasks heavily in reporting you may want to record any information you'd like to communicate by creating a Public Google Doc, Note, or Attachment instead.

Navigate to the Contact record (if needed)

1. If you have enough information to find the Contact you may want to use the Global Search bar.
2. If you do not have enough information to search or are working from a specific List View click on the Contacts Tab if showing in your default tabs or click on the All Tabs (+) button and click on Contacts in the list.
3. From Contacts Home you can either click on the name of the Contact, if showing in your default View, or select the appropriate selection from the dropdown in the View: Menu and click Go!
4. Once the appropriate Contact is visible click on the Contact Name in the list to bring up the Contact record.

Create a Public Task

1. Once on the Contact record there are two ways to get to creating a New Task:
   • At the top of the Contact record hovering over the text for Open Activities brings up a window where the New Task button is able to be clicked.
   • Further down on the page underneath the Contact Detail there is an Open Activities section of the page where there is a New Task button that is able to the clicked.
2. Once on the New Task screen fields can be manipulated as needed. How you manipulate these fields will likely be determined by internal business processes.
   • Assigned To will default to you as the User but if needed the Lookup icon can be used to assign the Task to a different User.
   • The Subject field will likely be determined by internal business processes and should be something descriptive or useful to the User the Task is being assigned to or another User that may be viewing the record.
   • Due Date will default to empty but can be manipulated as needed and will automatically affect the Reminder field below (which can then still be updated as needed).
   • Comments are where you will be putting the descriptive information that the Task is being created for and may be determined by internal business processes. Something useful to someone consuming the information should be put within this box.
   • The Related To field is important if you are trying to make a Task public. 
     • Putting any record type that is private (Asset, Case, Contract, List/Campaign, Opportunity, Product, Reserved Contact Data, Reserved Organization Data, or Travel) will default the Task to being private. 
     • The only two record types that can be associated here and retain the Task as public are Organization and Solution.
     • This field can be left blank but if needed select the appropriate record type from the dropdown and use the Lookup icon to search for the correct record to associate with the Task.
   • The Contact you have created the Task from will default in the Name field. The Lookup icon can be used to search for and associate other Contact records if needed.
   • Related Case allows you to use the Lookup icon to associate a Case with the Task as needed.
   • Type should be set according to internal business practices.
   • Direction should be set according to internal business practices.
   • Status should be set according to internal business practices.
   • Priority should be set according to internal business practices.
   • Phone and Email will be pulled from the Contact record and cannot be manipulated here.
   • If the task should be recurring the Create Recurring Series of Tasks checkbox being checked off will bring up options for selecting recurrence and date ranges.
   • Reminder will be pre-populated based on selections in the Due Date and Recurrence areas but can be manipulated here as needed.
   • If there are any supporting documents or other necessary attachments the Attach File button can be clicked in the Attachments section at the bottom of the screen.
3. Fill in all desired fields for the Task and if you would like to add another Task for this Contact record click on Save & New Task at the top or bottom of the screen.
4. Fill in all desired fields for the Task and if you are done adding Tasks to the current Contact click on Save to be brought back to the Contact record.