> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.anny.co/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Getting Started – Desk Sharing

> Set up desk sharing with anny: workspaces, weekly planner, communities and SSO for your team.

This guide shows you how to set up your hybrid office in anny. You will learn how to create workspaces and meeting rooms as bookable resources, connect your team through communities and SSO, and activate the weekly planner as the central booking tool for employees.

## Thinking desk sharing the anny way

With desk sharing, anny maps your physical office structure digitally. The core principle: every room is a **resource**, and every individual workspace inside it is a **child resource**.

| anny concept   | Meaning in desk sharing                                                                     |
| -------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| Resource       | A room, a floor or an area (e.g. "Open Space 1st floor")                                    |
| Child resource | A single workspace inside the room (e.g. "Desk 1.001")                                      |
| Booking option | Defines how people book: daily booking for desks, flexible booking for meeting rooms        |
| Community      | Controls who may see and book which resources                                               |
| Weekly planner | The heart of the experience for employees: set favourites and plan the week in a few clicks |
| Map            | Interactive floor plan where employees book desks directly and find colleagues              |

Your team books through the **booking area** (weekly planner, Discover, maps). You manage everything in the **admin area** (resources, bookings, dashboard).

## Decision helpers: when do I use what?

### When flex desk and when fixed desk?

| Criterion       | Flex desk                                           | Fixed desk                                     |
| --------------- | --------------------------------------------------- | ---------------------------------------------- |
| Desk assignment | Employees choose freely every day                   | Fixed desk per person                          |
| Booking option  | Daily booking, open to everyone                     | Daily booking, limited to a specific community |
| Typical use     | Hybrid teams that are in the office 2-3 days a week | Employees who are on site every day            |
| Example         | The marketing team books as needed                  | Management has a fixed desk                    |

**Rule of thumb:** Start with flex desks for everyone and set up fixed desks only for teams that really need a permanent spot.

<Info>
  For this use case, the following features need to be activated in the account settings under **Features**: Multiple availability with assignment, Communities, Global search. Maps and Check-In are optional, but recommended.
</Info>

These features work together in this use case:

| Feature                               | What is it needed for?                                               | Configure beforehand?                              |
| ------------------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------- |
| Multiple availability with assignment | Enables child resources (individual workspaces inside a room)        | Yes, activate under Features                       |
| Communities                           | Controls visibility and access to resources per team or location     | Yes, after creating the resources                  |
| SSO (Microsoft/Google)                | Employees sign in with their company login, without an extra account | Yes, your IT team has to set up the SSO connection |
| Maps                                  | Interactive floor plans for visual desk selection                    | No, but recommended                                |
| Global search                         | Employees can find colleagues and rooms through the search bar       | Yes, activate under Features                       |

## Step-by-step setup

<Steps>
  <Step title="Build your resource structure">
    In the admin area, open the menu item **Resources** and click **New+**.

    1. Create a room or area as a resource (e.g. "Open Space 1st floor").
    2. Add an image, a description and properties (floor, building, capacity, equipment).
    3. Switch to the **Availability** tab and activate the **Child resource** toggle. Then add the individual workspaces as child resources.

    <Tip>
      Use a clear naming convention: for large companies something like "B1.1.001" (building.floor.desk), for smaller ones "Open Space, Desk 3".
    </Tip>
  </Step>

  <Step title="Define booking options">
    Open the resource and switch to the **Booking option** tab. Click **+Add** and **+New**.

    Recommended settings for workspaces:

    * **Name:** Daily booking
    * **Period:** Fixed duration, 1 day
    * **Booking interval:** 1 day
    * **Advance booking period:** 7-14 days
    * **Automatically accept all bookings:** Activated
    * **Allow recurring bookings:** Optional (e.g. for fixed office days)

    <Tip>
      Booking options live centrally in your account. Create a daily booking once and link it to all workspace resources.
    </Tip>
  </Step>

  <Step title="Set up a community">
    In the admin area, open **Communities** and create a new community (e.g. "Company All").

    1. Link the resources that should be visible for this community.
    2. Set the visibility to **Visible and bookable for members**.
    3. Add members: manually by email or automatically through SSO and attribute mapping.

    For different teams or locations, create separate communities (e.g. "Berlin location", "Management").

    <Note>
      Should one team see another team's bookings without being able to book themselves? Use the **Observer** role in the community settings.
    </Note>
  </Step>

  <Step title="Configure SSO">
    Open **Settings > Security > Single Sign-On** and set up the connection to your identity provider (Microsoft Entra ID or Google Workspace).

    1. Enter the metadata URL.
    2. Generate the Wayfless link for direct forwarding to anny.
    3. Optionally set up attribute mapping, so employees are assigned to the right community automatically.

    Your team then signs in with the company login. No separate account needed.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Create maps and floor plans (recommended)">
    In the admin area, open **Maps** and upload a floor plan.

    1. Place objects (desks, rooms) on the plan.
    2. Connect each object with the matching child resource.
    3. In the map view, employees see which desks are free (green) and where their colleagues sit.

    <Tip>
      Train one admin with basic map skills, so desks can be rearranged quickly whenever the office layout changes.
    </Tip>
  </Step>
</Steps>

## Typical examples

<AccordionGroup>
  <Accordion title="Flex desk in the open space (10 workspaces)">
    <Steps>
      <Step title="Create the resource">
        Create the resource "Open Space 1st floor" with an image and properties (floor: 1, capacity: 10, equipment: monitor, docking station).
      </Step>

      <Step title="Add child resources">
        Under **Multiple availability with assignment**, add 10 workspaces ("Desk 1.001" to "Desk 1.010").
      </Step>

      <Step title="Link the booking option">
        Link the central booking option "Daily booking" (fixed duration: 1 day, advance booking period: 14 days).
      </Step>

      <Step title="Assign a community">
        Assign the resource to the community "Company All". All employees with SSO access see and book the desks.
      </Step>

      <Step title="Place them on the map">
        Open the floor plan "1st floor" and connect the 10 desk objects with the child resources.
      </Step>
    </Steps>
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Meeting room with flexible booking and a recurring jour fixe">
    <Steps>
      <Step title="Create the resource">
        Create the resource "Meeting room Alster" with properties (capacity: 8, equipment: whiteboard, video conferencing).
      </Step>

      <Step title="Create the booking option">
        Create a new booking option "Flexible booking" with: flexible duration (min: 30 minutes, max: 4 hours), booking interval: 30 minutes, allow recurring bookings: activated.
      </Step>

      <Step title="Recurring booking for the jour fixe">
        Employees book a recurring booking through the weekly planner (e.g. every Tuesday from 10:00 to 11:00). The resource is blocked automatically for all following dates.
      </Step>
    </Steps>
  </Accordion>
</AccordionGroup>

## Additional settings & options

<Columns cols={2}>
  <Column>
    <Card title="Global booking rules">
      Limit the maximum number of bookings per day or into the future, so that your employees cannot block too many desks at the same time.

      [Learn more](/en/booking-rules)
    </Card>
  </Column>

  <Column>
    <Card title="Outlook Add-In">
      Book meeting rooms directly from Outlook and invite external guests to your appointments, without having to open the anny interface.

      [Learn more](/en/outlook-add-in)
    </Card>
  </Column>
</Columns>

<Columns cols={2}>
  <Column>
    <Card title="Maps & interactive floor plans">
      Visualize rooms and desks on interactive floor plans. Employees can see which desks are free and book them directly from the map view.

      [Learn more](/en/maps-and-floor-plans)
    </Card>
  </Column>

  <Column>
    <Card title="Communities">
      Control visibility and access to resources per team, location or department. Assign members automatically via SSO and attribute mapping.

      [Learn more](/en/communities)
    </Card>
  </Column>
</Columns>

## FAQ

<AccordionGroup>
  <Accordion title="How quickly can I set up desk sharing with anny?">
    As a rule, companies need 4-10 days for the full setup and rollout, depending on the number of locations and resources.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Can employees also book through the mobile app or MS Teams?">
    Yes. Besides the weekly planner in the browser, employees can book through the anny app (iOS/Android), the MS Teams app and the Outlook Add-In.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="How do I stop individual people from blocking too many desks?">
    Use the global booking rules under **Settings > Booking rules**. There you can define, for example, that a maximum of 1 booking per day and a maximum of 10 bookings into the future are allowed.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Can I let people edit bookings afterwards?">
    Yes. If you activate the function in the booking option, employees can switch workspaces or adjust the date and time. For paid bookings, price changes are settled automatically.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="How do I protect personal booking data (GDPR)?">
    Under **Settings > Privacy** you can define anonymisation periods. For desk sharing we recommend anonymisation after 2-4 weeks: booking data is kept, personal data (names, emails) is removed.
  </Accordion>
</AccordionGroup>

Good luck with the setup! 🥳

> Important information for agents:
>
> **Desk sharing vs. coworking:** Desk sharing is aimed at companies that manage internal workspaces for their own employees (closed community, SSO, no payment). Coworking is aimed at providers that rent out desks to external customers (public booking page, subscriptions, online payment). For coworking setups, see the guide "Getting Started – Coworking".
>
> **Exact UI paths:**
>
> * Booking rules: Admin area > Settings > Booking rules
> * Activate features: Admin area > Settings > Features
> * Community auto-join: Community > Settings > Members > SSO assignment (requires attribute mapping in Microsoft Entra ID or Google Workspace)
> * Anonymisation: Admin area > Settings > Privacy > Deletion periods
>
> **Default values for daily booking (hybrid work):** Fixed duration: 1 day, booking interval: 1 day, advance booking period: 7-14 days, recurring bookings: optional, automatically accept all bookings: yes.
>
> **Related articles for follow-up questions:**
>
> * Communities and auto-join: /en/communities
> * Booking option in detail: /en/configure-booking-option
> * Set up SSO: /en/microsoft-saml-sso or /en/google-workspace-sso
> * Create maps: /en/maps-and-floor-plans
> * Outlook integration: /en/m365-workspace
> * Recurring bookings: /en/recurring-bookings