If you’re an MSP managing Google Workspace for your customers, you know first-hand how much time and energy is spent on common tickets that should be quick to resolve. Staying on top of provisioning new users, resetting passwords, configuring security policies can become a full-time job.
We’ve outlined 5 ways to save you time when managing Google Workspace for your customers.
- Create a Free account for Administration
Costs are top of mind for any business, and for Service Providers, this becomes particularly true when needing to add yet another product license. Luckily, you can create free accounts for admins in your Google Workspace. Here’s how:
Step 1: Login to the Google Admin Console with an existing admin account.
Step 2: Under Billing > Payment accounts, ensure a billing account is added. One likely exists if your customer is already deployed on Google Workspace
Step 3: Navigate to Billing > Subscriptions > Add or Upgrade a subscription > Cloud Identity and enable Cloud Identity Free
With Cloud Identity Free enabled, you can now disable Auto-Licensing for the Google Workspace license. Now you can return to Subscriptions and select the Google Workspace subscription. In the License settings section, disable Auto-Assign.
This allows you to create a new user without needing a paid Google Workspace license assigned. Now, you can instead select the Cloud Identity Free license – it’s as easy as that!
- Configure a Password Policy
A strong password policy is your first line of defense. Implementing a password policy at the organization level ensures everyone must follow the minimum requirement for creating strong passwords.
Your password policy is configured in Security > Settings. Ensure “Enforce strong password” is selected, any changes made should be enforced at the next sign-in, requiring your users to update their passwords to adhere to the updated policy. This is a great opportunity to remind your users of the makings of a great password, including avoidance of common words, seasons, and reusing the same passwords.
- Enable MFA/2FA
Multifactor authentication (MFA, also known as 2-step Verification, 2FA) is a security technology that requires multiple methods of authentication from independent categories of credentials to verify a user’s identity. This best practice applies both to admin users, like MSPs and their customers. It’s been said that 99% of current breaches could have been averted by applying MFA policies.
MFA options are located under Security > Settings > 2-Step Verification. Apply settings to organizations or groups to ensure that all users are required to use MFA. We strongly suggest enforcing enrolment, as this is one of your primary security measures for an organization.
- Add admin recovery options
As an admin, getting locked out of your environment is a recipe for disaster. Recovery options ensure that you have other ways of getting into your account if you forget your password or simply experience a glitch.
Login to the Admin console and select your profile at the top right > Manage your Google Account. Select the Security Tab and add a phone and secondary email to the “Ways that we can verify that it’s you” section.
- Backup your customer’s Google Workspace environment
Yes, Google has a great environment with backup and redundancy, but it can’t solve all scenarios. If a user deletes or modifies files they are gone, and you want recovery options for this. If a machine gets affected by a crypto locker, the files will synchronize the encryption. Additionally, you can only recover files one-at-a-time which is extremely time-consuming for both MSPs and their customer’s productivity. A simple backup solution is a safe bet against a future disaster.
Streamline 80-90% of daily requests
To streamline user management and close common IT requests faster, Augmentt Engage gives MSPs using Google Workspace a multi-tenant, multi-app view to quickly reset passwords, onboarding/offboard employees, check MFA status across each account in a matter of seconds. This means more time on more complex tasks to the appropriate higher-level engineer.
Adding tools may seem complex, but the beauty of Engage is in its simplicity. The platform was designed to help accelerate the management of M365 and other SaaS with streamlined provisioning, simpler daily user management, and improved security—all of which add up to increased productivity.
