Impactive users can be grouped into both lists and teams. Lists are an internal construct: only admins can create lists and see which users are on which lists. By contrast, teams are a public construct that is visible to users. Volunteer users can see the teams they're part of via both the web or mobile app volunteer interface, and it's also possible for volunteers to create their own teams.
Teams come with the same benefits of user lists - they can be used to publish actions to only certain teams, or to reassign conversations to only certain teams - but with additional benefits of a team group chat in the Impactive inbox, a team leaderboard, etc.
Admin-Created Teams
Admins can create teams under Users > Teams > + Create Team.
You'll set the team's visibility to Public or Private. Public teams are visible to volunteers: they are listed in leaderboards throughout the web and mobile app volunteer interfaces. Public teams can either be Open to Join, meaning that volunteers will be able to click Join where the team is listed in leaderboards, or Invite Only, meaning that they can only be joined by an admin adding a user.
Private teams are somewhat similar to user lists, in that they are not publicly visible to volunteers (are not listed in leaderboards) and cannot be freely joined by volunteers; however, private teams are useful for the creation of team-specific voter registration actions, as described here.
When creating a team, you can also decide whether or not to enable a team chat - this is a group chat that will be automatically created within team members' Impactive inboxes within the volunteer interface (web or mobile app). Team chats are great for building camaraderie, sharing announcements, etc. - but for particularly large teams, or volunteers that will be communicating in other ways, a team chat might not be necessary. (Don't worry, your choice here isn't final. Team chats can be enabled or disabled after team creation, too.)
User-Created Teams
Volunteers can create their own teams via the volunteer interface - this functionality is currently available for the volunteer mobile app only (not web). A volunteer's teams are listed in their profile tab of the mobile app; scroll down to see the Create button to launch a new team. User-created teams are always public, but the volunteer can choose whether the team is Open to Join or Invite Only. If volunteers create their own teams, admins will be able to see them listed in the administrator dashboard under Users > Teams.
Adding Users to Teams
Users can be added to teams in much the same way that they can be added to an overall campaign - manually, via join URL, or via join code. Read more about those methods of adding users here, noting that a team has its own join URL and join code in the same way that a campaign does.
For now, users must first join an Impactive campaign, then subsequently join a team (via manual invite, join URL, or join code).
Very soon (in spring 2025), team join URLs and team join codes will be able to simultaneously add a user to the campaign and to the team - making it super easy to welcome brand-new users onto teams! Stay tuned for this exciting upcoming release.
Team Leaders
All teams, whether admin-created or user-created, have a Team Leader. Volunteers who are Team Leaders have extra capabilities within the volunteer mobile app; they can edit the team's name and description, and remove team members.
By default, the Team Leader is the user who created the team (whether an admin or volunteer). But admins can edit the Team Leader by visiting the teams page in Users > Teams > individual team, then finding the desired user and clicking the menu at the far-right of their user row to Make Team Leader.
Functions via the Send and Manage Dropdowns
There are two dropdowns, Send and Manage, that are present at the top of the page when viewing a team. These dropdowns contain several key functions that can be performed with the users on that team.
The Send dropdown allows you to:
Send the team an individual action (which can also be done when creating and publishing an action).
Engage team members via push notification, direct message, or email - these are the same functions present in the Engage tab, which are further described here.
Send team members a text message via Broadcast Texting (which can also be done by creating a new broadcast and sending it to the team).
The Manage dropdown allows you to:
Add users to the team
Edit the team's name and settings
Customize the team's page, related to team-specific voter registration actions as described here