Distribution lists are widely used in iPassport to involve a group of people in some activity in one step.  Typically, distribution lists operate in a copy/paste fashion: current members are added to the specified activity, but no changes are made if the distribution list is updated later. However, for Skilled Groups, if a distribution list is used to populate the members, the system creates a permanent link. This ensures that any future updates to the distribution list are automatically applied to the linked skilled group.  The association is one-way, meaning changes made to the skilled group members will not be reflected in the associated distribution list.

Special relationship between Skilled Groups and Distribution Lists

This article covers the following:

1: Populating a Skilled Group with a Distribution List

1. Both the skilled group and the distribution list must have been created first
   1. Distribution lists do not require being of any specific type ('List Type') to be used in skilled groups, but this is a user-configurable list and you can add the type 'Skilled Group List' or similar to identify it.
2. Open the skilled group's 'Users' tab
3. Click the link on the far right of the header area of the list of users - '⊕ Add User'
   
   
4. In the pop-up window which appears, find the relevant distribution list(s) and tick the checkbox next to them
   1. Optionally mark the new staff as having read all the documents in the skilled group.  By ticking the checkbox next to 'Add users(s) as already skilled', the system will prevent sending tasks to them and create 'confirmed' skill records for each new member on each of the documents contained.
   2. Otherwise, you can adjust the fields of the tasks to be generated according to your requirements ('Due Date', 'Active Date', 'Description', etc.)
5. Click 'Create Task(s)'

From this point onwards, if you update the distribution list, the members of the associated skilled group will be updated accordingly.

When you then add documents to skilled groups, the system will know who has read which documents and will only issue reading tasks for those documents which haven't been read.

2: Identifying linked Skilled Groups and Distribution Lists

• There are two places where you can find associations between skilled groups and distribution lists:
  • In Skilled Groups, under the 'Users' tab, the pop-up window, when you click  '⊕ Add User' displays associated distribution lists in the header area. Click the 'Distribution Lists' banner to expand it if it appears collapsed.
    
    
    
    
  • In Distribution Lists, the 'General' tab will have an added section for 'Skilled Groups' if it has been associated with one or more.
    
    

3: Unlinking a Distribution List from a Skilled Group

• Unfortunately, iPassport currently lacks a tool to dissociate linked skilled groups and distribution lists.  If it becomes necessary to do this, the solution is to delete the distribution list and create it again.  To facilitate this operation, you can produce a CSV 'print' of the distribution list first, to have all the details readily available when recreating the distribution list.

This video helps understand the steps visually: