Collaborators FAQ

Answers to common questions about collaborator access, contributor status, and reporting in PEARS.

Collaborator practices can vary by organization. Use your organization's guidance when deciding who to add and mark as a contributor.

What's the difference between access and contributor status?

Access controls how a collaborator can use a record. Choose View Only for read access or View & Edit for edit access. Adding a user as a collaborator also associates the record with their name for individual reporting.

Contributor identifies a collaborator who helped make the activity happen. It does not change their access level. Use the contributor designation when you need to identify people directly involved in the work.

The Role or contribution field records details about a person's involvement. The No. of Sessions field records how many sessions they joined. Both fields are optional notes. These are optional and do not affect other PEARS features or reporting.

For setup instructions, see Collaborators and Contributors.

How do I designate employees who helped deliver a program?

Add each person as a collaborator on the Program Activity. Check Contributor for each person who was involved in delivering or performing the work. Select the access level they need independently.

Can multiple people receive credit and access to a program activity?

Yes. If you add both people as collaborators on the Program Activity their names are then associated with the record for individual reporting. Set View Only or View & Edit access for each person.

To find all records associated with a person, use the Collaborators filter and select their name. Results include records they created and records where another team member added them as a collaborator.

TIP: The Collaborators filter is included in most modules and dashboards.

Can each collaborator link their own Action Plans?

Yes. Collaborators can link their own Action Plans to a record.

TIP: PEARS does not add these links automatically. Each collaborator must open the record and update its General Information section. They can then add the Action Plan or plans that apply to their work.

Do multiple collaborators duplicate statewide counts?

No. Adding collaborators supports individual reporting without duplicating effort or impact in broader unit or institution-level reports.

Individual reports can include the data for each activity a collaborator is named on. You can optionally limit these results to collaborators marked as contributors.

Unit or institution-level reports aggregate data per record, not per collaborator. For example, one Program Activity remains one record, so its participants, sessions, and other data are counted once regardless of collaborator count.