Article

5 tips for getting others to share Smartsheet items with you

by Rey Gonzalez

Editor's Note: The Home screen is now called Browse, and a folder icon has replaced the house icon in the left navigation menu within the Smartsheet platform.

As a free user, you’re a dynamic member of your organization and valuable contributor to your team’s success. That’s why it’s important for your coworkers and business stakeholders to share relevant items with you when working in the Smartsheet platform. 

Often, there are specific reasons for who gets shared to what within Smartsheet. For example, if you’re in sales and your marketing department uses Smartsheet for various campaigns, you probably don’t need to be shared to their project plan sheets. However, they could share a finished asset sheet that they update in real time, so you always have the newest collateral to help educate and persuade prospective customers. 

So, why else do you need to be shared to items, who should you ask for access, how do you find items shared with you, and what should you do if you hit a roadblock? Here are five quick tips to get shared to something, so you can keep contributing at a high level.

  1. Learn why you need to be shared-to

  2. Find items others have shared with you

  3. Find out who needs to share items with you

  4. What to do if you hit a roadblock

  5. Create your own work

1. Learn why you need to be shared-to

Since free users can’t create their own sheets, it’s necessary to have a sheet shared with you. With a sheet to work on, and depending on your permission level, you can edit rows, columns, and conditional formatting, attach files, add comments, change sheet views, and share with your colleagues. 

Once you have access to the sheet, you can make even more meaningful contributions to short- and long-term projects in order to help your team and organization move work forward, meet deadlines, and exceed goals. 

2. Find items others have shared with you

In order to confirm if you’ve been shared-to within Smartsheet, click on the three-line menu in the upper-left-hand corner and select the home button. Under home, you can see all of the Smartsheet items you have been shared-to. 

If you see that no one has shared items with you, you‘ll need to find someone who will. It was likely an oversight that you weren’t shared-to; after all, someone at your company is definitely counting on you! You’ll just need to reach out to the right person.

3. Find out who needs to share items with you 

While every organization is different, there are a few places to start when looking to find someone to share important Smartsheet items — such as sheets, dashboards, and reports — with you.

  1. Find a Smartsheet licensed user. Start with your manager. Either they or someone they know can share the right items with you, or at the very least, help point you in the right direction.

  2. Find your System Admin. Go to your Account Settings by clicking on your avatar in the upper-right-hand corner, and select Account Administration. Here you’ll see the name of the account administrator, and you can follow up with them.

4. What to do if you hit a roadblock

If you don’t make any headway with the two options above, don’t give up! If your organization has been using Smartsheet for a while, chances are asking others in your department or in adjacent departments will lead you to another Smartsheet user. 

You were invited to Smartsheet for a reason, so make sure you can start contributing by getting shared-to. However, in larger organizations, it can be a real challenge to track down the right people who are using the Smartsheet platform. So sometimes, you have to take matters into your own hands by signing up for a trial or requesting a license.

Template gallery on the Smartsheet website

5. Create your own work

If you request a license and are approved, or start a trial you'll be able to create — whether that’s project plan sheets, status reports, or executive dashboards — within the Smartsheet platform. 

To make sure you’re granted a license and become a successful creator once you get one, take advantage of our library of learning resources, template gallery, and more that will help you plan what you want to build before you make the license request.

 

Start a trial Request a license