How to Approach Security in Dynamics GP
If you are a Dynamics GP user, you may have questions or concerns about effectively managing your security settings and roles within your system. Security plays a crucial role in maintaining data integrity, ensuring compliance, and improving user experience.
In this article, I’ll explain how security components work in Dynamics GP, best practices for keeping your system secure, and how, over the past 20 years as a GP consultant, I’ve helped clients create and test new users and roles based on their needs and audits.
Table of Contents
- Importance of Security Planning in Dynamics GP
- Understanding Security Components in Dynamics GP
- Dynamics GP 10.0 Role Conversion
- Best Practices
Importance of Security Planning in Dynamics GP
Security planning is the process of defining and assigning security roles, tasks, and permissions to your Dynamics GP users based on their job responsibilities. By doing so, you control what users can access and do in your system, preventing unauthorized or accidental changes to critical data.
It’s important to pay attention to security in Dynamics GP to avoid errors and downtime that can result from users running utilities or reconciliations that can change data without proper backup or testing.
I often get requests from clients who want to create new users or assign roles based on what Microsoft provides out-of-the-box, and I will always advise that we first test and validate the security settings before handing them to the users. The roles that Microsoft defines might not always match your needs or expectations.
Understanding Security Components in Dynamics GP
Security in Dynamics GP is a way of controlling what users can access and do within the system. Here is an overview of the security features in Dynamics GP:
Role-Based Security: Dynamics GP uses a role-based security model, which means that security is managed by assigning roles to users. Each role consists of a collection of tasks, with each task consisting of specific operations.
Security Roles: Roles are collections of tasks that define a job in the company. Users are assigned roles that determine their permissions within GP. A few examples of roles you would see in GP include the following:
- AP Clerk – This role would consist of tasks related to performing Accounts Payable processes within GP.
- Bookkeeper – This role would consist of giving a user the ability to complete tasks that a bookkeeper would normally complete.
- PowerUser – This role would give access to all functions within GP.
Security Tasks: Tasks are groups of operations needed to complete a business process, such as entering vendor data or posting payables transactions.
Security Operations: Operations are base-level security elements. Operations can include access to specific windows, reports and posting permissions within Dynamics GP.
When thinking about who are the users that need to be set up, there are a few aspects to consider:
- What companies do they need to work with?
- What is their job?
- What reports do they need access to?
- What transactions will they need to do?
- Are they allowed to post?
- Should they be able to configure the system?
- Is there anything that they are not allowed to see?
- Are they a read-only user?
Dynamics GP 10.0 Role Conversion
Dynamics GP converted to role-based security with the release of Dynamics GP 10.0 in 2007. This change allowed for more granular control over user permissions by assigning roles based on specific tasks and operations within the system.
When upgrading to Dynamics GP 10.0, the option to convert security was available. If you went forward with this conversion, you would see roles that were created based off your existing security; these roles begin with ‘CNV_’. Each GP user was then assigned this converted role so they could still access Dynamics GP like they had in their previous version.
Best Practices to Approach Security in Dynamics GP
Over the years of working with clients and their security, I have built some simple rules that I advise all my clients to follow:
Avoid modifying existing roles or tasks: Don’t delete or tweak existing security roles or tasks that work today. Instead, copy and create new ones that you can modify and test.
Test new roles and tasks: Assign new roles or tasks to a trial user and test them before assigning them to live users.
Regular security review: Review and audit your security settings periodically and make sure they are up to date and aligned with your business processes and requirements.
Create a system password for critical actions: Use a system password to protect certain system-level windows within GP, such as deleting a company or a user.
Testing beyond descriptions: Be conservative and cautious with what you grant access to. Don’t assume that a role or task does what it says it does. Always test them to understand their actual behavior, for instance an AP clerk role might not include the ability to post batches, even though you might expect it to.
Regular security review: Review and audit your security settings periodically and make sure they are up to date and aligned with your business processes and requirements.
Security is not difficult to manage, but it does take time and requires attention to detail. I recommend working with an experienced Dynamics GP partner who can help you with security projects and provide you with the knowledge and tools to manage your security settings.
Learn More about Security in Dynamics GP
If you want to learn more about security in GP, you can check out some of the existing articles and resources that we have on our website, such as:
Please reach out to us if you have any questions or need any help with your security in GP. We have a team of experienced GP consultants who can assist you with your security needs and challenges.
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