head@ email address - direct access for new head or forward to another account?

[TwistedHelixis]

Sorry, this could have gone in a few other forums, please move if not in the correct one.

 

We have a new head starting at a school. The school currently has the default head@ acc that the current head logs in as, but I am wondering if the new head should just get a new email acc using their name and then forward all emails from the head@ acc?

 

The school is also a G Suite school so this account will be their main way in to G Suite.

 

If the new head simply takes over the old head acc I can see pros and cons to this, they will have easy access to all the past emails, documents etc that the old head had but is this then a data protection issue.

 

What are others doing?

[pete]

Headteacher uses [email protected]er as their mailbox, same as everyone else.

 

There's also a shared mailbox that they and their PA have access to for generic stuff (by which I mean mostly spam). We encourage the head to let their PA filter out anything legitimate that merits a response and pass it on.

 

Anyone who's a significant budget holder shouldn't be the main recipient for a catchall mailbox - there's too much chance of successful spear-phishing.

[TwistedHelixis]

Anyone who's a significant budget holder shouldn't be the main recipient for a catchall mailbox

Agreed but this is a very small primary school with about 8 full time staff (that includes the teachers) and I trust the office staff less when in comes to phishing issues, but that is a different thread....

[crc-ict]

I don't like the idea of generic accounts like head@ for services like G Suite.

 

I see two ways of dealing with this: either make the head@ account just an alias, and forward it to the head's personal address or to the office; or maintain the head@ account as a mailbox, but then give the head's personal account and any Head's PA or admin person who need access delegated permissions to the account. They can then access it via the 'Google Menu' in the top right of G-mail.

 

We have actually phased out the concept of the head@ e-mail account entirely, everything goes either to him directly by his own account, or through the office@ account which is the only non-personal account we use.

[PrimaryNetMan]

rename head@ to head.old@ then create new head a new account and add head@ as an alias

[Ditto]

Sorry, this could have gone in a few other forums, please move if not in the correct one.

We have a new head starting at a school. The school currently has the default head@ acc that the current head logs in as, but I am wondering if the new head should just get a new email acc using their name and then forward all emails from the head@ acc?

The school is also a G Suite school so this account will be their main way in to G Suite.

If the new head simply takes over the old head acc I can see pros and cons to this, they will have easy access to all the past emails, documents etc that the old head had but is this then a data protection issue.

What are others doing?

It's a really good question!

 

In a previous school with GSuite and GMail accounts, we had a number of staff whose primary email was a generic name - like 'head', 'admissions', 'office'. Generally, personal names were aliases. We had a couple of case where for data reasons, we renamed the old accounts and then started a new one. So 'admissions' was renamed 'exadmissions'. It's hard to see why an incoming head would not have a justified cause to take over the previous email account, but as you point out, it does raise data privacy concerns. If the outgoing head had personal, unrelated to school stuff, in their, then they shouldn't have, but it doesn't remove the the data privacy concern. However, I can say that starting with a new account had many headaches - many around Google document sharing. If your school uses Team drive, it can help a lot. If you need to review the previous heads documents and decide which are safe to share with the incoming head (and whose decision is that anyway!), then you'll probably want to use something like GAM to do that semi-scripted. You might want to visit the your data privacy documents, including looking a retention policies.

 

On a similar theme, when a teacher leaves, what do you do with their documents. Generally we didn't worry about emails but their folders were usually handed to the head - and that wasn't always ideal!

[Steve21]

Any head@ style emails go to PA or contact@ reception etc, only direct name emails go to head etc

 

Adds a nice level of crap filtering!

 

Steve

[jmcdermott]

I always setup Head@/Secretary@/Reception@/Finance@ as aliases or groups, easy to re arrange with the ending changing staff.

[NetworkServices]

Always used the format firstname.lastname@ here. Anything like headteacher@ or reception@ are Exchange mailing lists which are easily manipulated for added granularity.

[caffrey]

Problem with mailing lists we found was say you had a general info mailing list - who do you know read and answered any emails ? At least with a generic mailbox you can see at a glance what's been opened.

[NetworkServices]

Problem with mailing lists we found was say you had a general info mailing list - who do you know read and answered any emails ? At least with a generic mailbox you can see at a glance what's been opened.

Perhaps unbelievably they do a pretty good job of sorting that out among themselves. Usually whomever responds will do a 'reply all'.

[FN-GM]

Problem with mailing lists we found was say you had a general info mailing list - who do you know read and answered any emails ? At least with a generic mailbox you can see at a glance what's been opened.

 

Also when new people stater they can't get hold of anything that was sent previously. With a shared mailbox it is all there.

[witch]

TBH I would just give the new head the old head's email - I am sure that there will be things that he/she needs to know and this makes it easier.

I would write to the current head and state that they MUST remove any personal data from that email by xxx date because of GDPR concerns. I would have thought that would be enough

[elsiegee40]

TBH I would just give the new head the old head's email - I am sure that there will be things that he/she needs to know and this makes it easier.

I would write to the current head and state that they MUST remove any personal data from that email by xxx date because of GDPR concerns. I would have thought that would be enough

 

I am not sure you can. The mailbox will contain lots of stuff personal to the previous head. GDPR would prevent it.

 

I would

1. rename the existing Head mailbox.

2. Create a Jbloggs@ mailbox for the new head

3. Create a Head@ alias for the jbloggs@ mailbox

[caffrey]

It's simple to redirect mail in the Gmail admin console, just add a default route under Gmail advanced settings so if someone leaves you can preappend the message envelope and send to another mailbox - works better than aliases

[TwistedHelixis]

Thanks for all the advice. I have decided to create the new head an account using his initial+surname@ and forward any emails from head@. The school have most of their documents in G Suite Team Drives so if the old head needs anything else (old emails atc) I can give them limited access and migrate anything they need.

[PrimaryNetMan]

Also when new people stater they can't get hold of anything that was sent previously. With a shared mailbox it is all there.

Just delegate the old mailbox if required.

[chazzy2501]

I give the head a regular mailbox but then add the head@ alias to their account. When the head changes, I remove the alias from one account and move it to the other.

[FishCustard]

I am not sure you can. The mailbox will contain lots of stuff personal to the previous head. GDPR would prevent it.

 

I would

1. rename the existing Head mailbox.

2. Create a Jbloggs@ mailbox for the new head

3. Create a Head@ alias for the jbloggs@ mailbox

 

^Do this^ to avoid any GDPR issues - please!

 

I'd recommend a separate head@ inbox to limit the chances of successful phishing. Of course, in very small schools without a Head's PA/Office Manager type position this may not make sense.