Invite your team
GCM is designed for teams. Even a small church usually has a senior pastor, an administrator, and one or two leaders who need access. This article walks you through inviting someone, choosing their role, and what they see when they accept.
1. Open Users & Roles
In the sidebar, go to Users & Roles. You'll see a list of everyone who can sign in to your workspace.
TIP
Don't confuse users with members. A user is someone who can sign in and use GCM. A member is someone in your congregation. The two overlap (a pastor is both), but most members will never sign in.
2. Click "Invite user"
The invitation form needs:
- Name — for the welcome email and the audit log.
- Email — must be a real address, since they'll receive a sign-up link.
- Role(s) — see the table below. You can assign more than one.
- Org unit — if your church has branches, centers, or cells, scope this person to the unit they oversee. Leaders see only members inside their assigned units.
Click Send invite. We pre-create their profile, link the role(s), then hand off to Supabase Auth to deliver the email.
3. What roles can do
GCM ships with three built-in roles. You can add more under Roles (RBAC v2 feature flag).
| Role | Scope | Typical use |
|---|---|---|
| Admin | Full access to every module | Lead pastor, executive admin |
| Shepherd | Read + edit members in their assigned units only | Section leaders, cell coordinators |
| Member | Self-service: view and edit own profile | Anyone you want signing in to update their own data |
INFO
Behind the scenes there are also platform_admin and superadmin roles. These are reserved for the GCM team and cannot be assigned from the UI.
Permission breakdown
| Module | Admin | Shepherd | Member |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dashboard | full | scoped | personal |
| Members | full | read + edit, scoped | self only |
| Attendance | full | scoped | view own |
| Giving | full | hidden by default | view own |
| Messaging | full | send to scope | none |
| Workflows | full | none | none |
| Reports | full | submit assigned | submit assigned |
| Billing | admin only | none | none |
| Users & Roles | admin only | none | none |
Shepherd scope follows the org unit hierarchy. A shepherd on the East Branch sees every member in East and any descendant unit (centers, cells), but nothing in West Branch.
4. What the invitee sees
The recipient gets an email from noreply@geniuschurchmanager.com titled You've been invited to [your church]. The link opens a page where they set a password and accept.
After they sign in for the first time, the auth-hook edge function injects their organization ID into the JWT, so RLS scopes every query they make to your church automatically.
WARNING
The invite link is valid for 7 days. If it expires, return to Users & Roles, click the user's row, and choose Resend invitation.
5. Editing or revoking access
Click any user to:
- Change role — open the roles dialog and toggle assignments. Takes effect on their next request.
- Reassign unit — useful when a leader moves between branches.
- Disable — keeps the user record (for audit history) but blocks sign-in.
- Delete — removes the user entirely. Activity they performed stays attached to your church via foreign-key-on-delete, so the audit trail isn't broken.
WARNING
You can't demote the last superadmin in the workspace. A database trigger blocks that change so you can't lock yourself out. If you really need to move ownership, promote a second user to admin first.
Common questions
Can I invite someone who already uses GCM at a different church? Yes. We match by email — if they already have an account they just gain access to your workspace too. They switch between churches from the sidebar.
Does the invitee have to be in our members list? No. The user and member records are independent. You can invite an outside consultant or auditor without adding them as a member of your congregation.
Can shepherds invite other users? Not by default. Only admins can issue invitations and assign roles.
Next steps
- Set up your org structure so your shepherds have meaningful scopes.
- Choose a plan if your team is growing past the free limits.