Understand roles and permissions

Onplana resolves every permission along two independent axes: the role you hold in the organization, and the role you hold inside each project. A person can be a plain Member at the organization level and still be the Project Owner of the projects they create.

Organization roles

• Owner: full control, always. Manages billing, edits the permission matrix, and can promote or demote anyone. The Owner’s access can never be restricted.
• Admin: governs the platform itself, security settings, integrations, governance configuration, and audit. Cannot change the plan or edit the permission matrix.
• Portfolio Manager: runs portfolios, teams, gate reviews, and the project pipeline. Can create projects and see every project in the organization by default.
• Member: regular contributor. Sees projects they own or are added to. By default, Members can create their own projects and become the Project Owner of those.
• Guest: external collaborator with access only to the projects they are explicitly added to. No organization-wide reads.

Project roles

Inside each project, membership carries its own role: Project Owner (automatically the creator), Project Manager, Project Member, Project Contributor, and Project Viewer. These control task creation and editing, member management, sprints, budgets, and so on, regardless of the person’s organization role.

The permission matrix

Open Organization Settings and go to the Permissions tab. The matrix shows two tables: organization-level actions (resolved against organization roles) and project-level permissions (resolved against project roles). Every cell is a toggle, so you can tighten or loosen the defaults to match how your organization operates.

Only the Owner can save changes to the matrix. Admins and Portfolio Managers can view it read-only. This is deliberate: it prevents an Admin from granting themselves broader rights through the matrix.

Posture presets

Instead of toggling rows one by one, pick a posture above the matrix:

• Open: any member can do almost anything. Flat teams and startups.
• Standard (recommended): Members run their own work, Portfolio Managers oversee teams, Admins govern. This matches the defaults.
• Strict: Members consume the platform; Portfolio Managers and Admins build it.
• Formal PMO: projects originate only from the proposal pipeline, and every configuration change is centralized.

A preset stamps a coherent set of organization-level toggles; project-level rows are left untouched. You can still hand-tune individual rows after applying one, then select Save.

Tip

The preset that matches your current matrix is highlighted, so you can tell at a glance which posture your organization is on, and whether someone has hand-tuned it since.

The last-Owner safeguard

An organization must always have at least one Owner. Onplana blocks demoting or removing the last Owner. To transfer ownership, promote another member to Owner first, then demote yourself or leave.

FAQs

Why can my Admin not edit the matrix? Matrix editing is restricted to the Owner so that nobody can widen their own permissions. Admins can review the matrix and ask the Owner to apply changes.

Can Members really create projects? Yes, by default, and the creator becomes the Project Owner of that project. Organizations that want projects to flow through a pipeline turn this off with the Formal PMO preset or the individual toggle.

What is the difference between Portfolio Manager and Project Manager? Portfolio Manager is an organization role with oversight across projects. Project Manager is a per-project role inside a single project. The same person can hold either, both, or neither.

Can I add roles beyond the defaults? Yes, on the Business plan and above you can define custom project roles. See Create custom roles.