On Thursday evening, Marta, the owner of a six-person agency, is preparing invitations to the project for client Nord's website. Access for the contractor - designer Michał - and copywriter Ania should cover only this project. The job will take three months, but quotes for other clients and internal conversations should stay out of their view. She'll send the invitations on Friday, after setting up the permissions in Task Manager.
Access for a contractor starts at the Workspace boundary
A separate Workspace lets you assign a contractor to a project without assigning them to the other spaces. A Workspace is a separate space for tasks and chats related to a project, team or topic; a user only sees the spaces they belong to. The Workspaces overview shows more about this boundary.
Marta creates "Nord - website": she clicks the "+" next to "Workspaces" in the left-hand column, enters the name and saves. This button is visible to the global administrator or to someone with the "Can add Workspaces" permission. Marta can also ask the AI Assistant: "Create a workspace called Nord - website". The Assistant will open a form with the name already filled in, which still needs to be saved.
The screenshot shows several spaces from the demo account. An external designer assigned only to the Nord project wouldn't see the other Workspaces on their list. The "All" entry isn't a gateway to the whole company either: it gathers tasks and chats only from the spaces available to that person.
The project name alone doesn't protect anything, though. If Marta puts a conversation about margins in the Nord space, she'll share it with the participants of that space. She keeps internal arrangements in "Sales", and moves to the Nord project only the conversations and tasks the designer and copywriter need.
Three fields separate participation from the right to create
In each Workspace you set the "Administrator", "Tasks" and "Chats" permissions separately. The last two fields allow creating new tasks or chats, and don't on their own decide whether a person can write in an existing thread they've been added to. The overview of roles and permissions helps separate these cases.
On Friday, Marta ticks "Tasks" and "Chats" for designer Michał only in the Nord Workspace, since he needs to submit new mock-ups and start conversations about project variants. Copywriter Ania is meant to work in threads she's added to; Marta doesn't give her the right to create new tasks or chats. Ania can still read and write in the threads assigned to her. When someone doesn't have permission to add tasks or chats in any available Workspace, the "Add task" and "Add chat" icons are hidden for them.
The screenshot shows all three permissions ticked for one space. You don't need to copy this setup for a contractor. "Administrator" means managing that Workspace: adding and removing participants, changing settings, and being able to edit and delete other people's tasks and chats. Ticking it automatically enables and locks the "Tasks" and "Chats" fields.
If you tick any permission, the app will add that person to the Workspace. If you want to revoke access to the whole space, untick it for that person - the app will clear the entire row. You can change the assignment in the Users window or via the ⋮ menu on the space's card, by choosing "Edit workspace" and the "Assign users" section.
You create the account, the invited person sets the password
A contractor's account is created by the global administrator, and the invited person sets their own password after receiving the email. You don't create a separate guest role for them: you choose the global "User" role and define access to specific Workspaces.
Marta clicks the group icon in the top left corner, opens the "Add" tab and enters Michał's email, first name and surname. She selects the "User" role, and below, in the "Assign to Workspaces" table, ticks only the Nord space and the needed permissions. After saving, Michał receives an invitation. If the message doesn't arrive, Marta uses the "Resend" button next to his name.
In the same form, Marta decides whether Michał can use AI in tasks, AI in chats, and the separate AI Assistant window. Without the relevant permission, the corresponding options don't appear in his interface. Internet access for the AI Assistant is off by default for a user; the global administrator always has it. The Mail and Automations toggles only appear in the Pro plan, as the Standard plan doesn't include these modules.
Before sending the invitation, Marta also checks the "General" Workspace. During installation, a "Shared" chat is created in it, which newly added people join automatically within the limits of their access to that space. If Michał doesn't have access to "General", it isn't a channel for him to talk in. If he does, the content of that chat should be suitable to show him.
A task link doesn't replace permissions
Simply sending a contractor the link to a task doesn't give them access to its content. "Copy task link" leads to the thread, but someone without access will see a message instead of the conversation. Likewise, a file's address alone isn't enough to download it: the application checks permissions.
On Monday, Marta sends Michał the address of a task from a different Workspace by mistake. The link won't open the conversation for him, as he has no access to it. Still, it's better to correct the mistake than to treat the link as a way of inviting people: working together requires an account and the right assignment.
Not every piece of content in the application inherits access from the Workspace. A note remains private until its author shares it; assigning a note to a Workspace is a label, not sharing. A mailbox is also private, and linking an email to a task is a navigation shortcut - it doesn't show the content of the correspondence to others. Conversations with the AI Assistant also remain private. The Assistant only sees what the person using it has access to.
There's one important exception to the Workspace boundary: the global administrator sees and manages all Workspaces, tasks and chats. You can't exclude them from the Nord project. So Marta keeps that role for herself and gives contractors the "User" role. If you'd like to check more precisely who sees tasks under each role, we've broken it down with separate examples.
Once the job is done, deactivate the account if you want to free up the seat
Deactivation cuts off the ability to log in and frees up the licence seat, but keeps the contractor's data and tasks. In the user's profile, switch off the "Active" toggle; you don't need to delete the project history to make room for the next person.
On Friday, after the website is handed over, Marta has three different options. She can uncheck the Nord Workspace for Michał, if he's still to work in other spaces. She can deactivate the account if she's ending the collaboration with him - when he tries to log in, Michał will see a plain "Incorrect email or password" message. She can also set the status to "Blocked" if she needs to interrupt an active session: the application clears sessions and remembered devices, logs the user out on their next click, and informs them of the block. Blocking doesn't free up the seat. It can't be applied to yourself or to another global administrator.
Every active contractor occupies one seat defined in the licence key. When Marta deactivates Michał, the seat returns to the pool and can be taken by the next person, provided the limit allows it.
Marta can check seat usage in the "Add" tab in the Users window, or under Settings → Advanced → Licence. Once the limit is reached, the application will block adding or activating another account. To increase the limit, you need to enter a new key.
Task Manager charges for the licence once, based on the number of seats, with no per-user subscription. The Starter plan covers up to 8 people and costs 690 PLN in the Standard variant; Classic covers up to 20 people and costs 1,490 PLN.
The licence is perpetual, includes 12 months of updates, and any later renewal is optional. If you'd like to compare this model with recurring payments, see the subscription vs licence breakdown for a team.
Don't look for an "Archive workspace" button - there's no such operation. You can archive individual tasks and chats; they then no longer count towards unread items or the total shown in the bubble next to the space.
Deleting an entire Workspace requires retyping its name and irreversibly removes the tasks, chats, messages and attached files. If you want to keep a record of how the collaboration went, don't delete the space just because the job has ended.
Settle three things before sending the invitation
Before sending an invitation, decide which content belongs to the shared space, what the contractor is allowed to create in it, and who will close their access once the work is handed over.
Tomorrow, list the projects that external people are working on. For each one, note what should go into the shared Workspace, who can simply write in existing threads, and when you'll disable their account. Task Manager keeps the application's data on your own server, and the licence doesn't require a subscription per person. You can see how spaces and permissions are set up in the Demo.
Frequently asked questions
Can a contractor have access to only one project?
Yes, assign them the "User" role and just one Workspace. A user sees only the spaces they've been assigned to; a global administrator sees all of them.
Does an external person occupy a licence seat?
Yes, an active contractor account occupies a seat. Once the collaboration ends, turn off "Active" to free up the seat while keeping the data and tasks.
What happens when a contractor receives a link to a task they can't access?
They'll see a message rather than the task content. The link leads to the thread, but it doesn't grant permissions.
Does the global administrator see a contractor's conversations in their Workspace?
Yes, the global administrator sees tasks and chats in all Workspaces. However, they don't see private notes, another person's mailbox, or a user's conversations with the AI Assistant.
What's the difference between deactivating an account and blocking it?
Deactivation prevents logging in and frees up the seat, while blocking ends the session on the next click but doesn't free up the seat. When logging in, a deactivated person sees a message about an invalid email or password, while a blocked person sees information that they've been blocked by an administrator.
Sources
The Task Manager Team - we write about teamwork, AI in business and keeping tasks organised, using examples from Task Manager, software installed on your own server. Task Manager has been developed by Blue Creation Group (Piotr Łącz) since 2013 and is used by organisations including Neonet, the Military University of Technology and Polpharma - read customer reviews. We check our articles against the user guide and the latest version of the software.
