Set Up and Manage Shared Spaces (For Admins)
Learn how to enable and configure Shared Spaces, external sharing, and guest accounts for your organization.
Last updated: Jun 3, 2026
Overview
Shared Spaces allow you to organize and share Workflows, Playbooks, Vaults, and Assistant Threads in secure collaboration environments.
As a workspace admin, you control:
- Who can create and use Shared Spaces
- Who can collaborate with other Harvey organizations
- Who can invite non-Harvey users as guests
By the end of this article, you’ll understand how to:
- Enable the correct permissions
- Configure external sharing approvals
- Set up guest access
- Communicate collaboration models to your team
Shared Spaces are secure, branded collaboration environments in Harvey that allow teams to organize and share tools, data, and work product in one place. They support multiple modes of collaboration:
- Internal Spaces: Organize resources within your own workspace. Great for practice groups, project teams, or knowledge management.
- External Spaces: Spaces shared between two Harvey organizations. Both organizations can contribute and access shared resources while maintaining separate data visibility and approval controls.
- Guest Accounts: Invite non-Harvey users into a Shared Space using a limited-access account. Guests authenticate through a secure email link and can only access the Spaces they're invited to.
All members of a Space see the same resources within that Space. You can grant higher access levels on individual resources when needed.
Collaboration Permissions
Important: Shared Spaces is fully opt-in. Collaboration features are disabled by default. You must explicitly enable each permission before users can access Shared Spaces or collaborate externally.
You can manage shared spaces permissions in Settings > Users.
Each permission controls a different level of collaboration:
Permission | What It Enables | Recommended For |
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Note: These permissions are independent. You can combine them based on your organization’s collaboration model.
Permission Configurations
Use Shared Spaces | Create Shared Spaces | Invite Shared Spaces | External Collaboration | What Your Users Can Do | Typical Use Case |
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✅ Enabled | ❌ Disabled | ❌ Disabled | ❌ Disabled |
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✅ Enabled | ✅ Enabled | ❌ Disabled | ❌ Disabled |
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✅ Enabled | ✅ Enabled | ✅ Enabled | ❌ Disabled |
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✅ Enabled | ✅ Enabled | ✅ Enabled | ✅ Enabled |
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❌ Disabled | ❌ Disabled | ❌ Disabled | ✅ Enabled |
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Manage Permissions
Permissions can be managed per user, by role, or for all users.
Option 1: Enable for Specific Users
- Go to Settings → Users
- Search for the user you want to enable
- Select Manage Permissions
- Search for the relevant permission name
- Select Add permissions
Option 2: Enable Permissions by Role
- Go to Settings → Roles
- Expand the Collaboration permission category
- Select Edit Table
- Check the appropriate permission boxes for each role. Check the boxes for every role to enable for all users.
- Select Save
Tip: Start by enabling shared spaces for all users to encourage internal adoption. Then selectively enable external collaboration for users who actively collaborate with other organizations.
External Collaboration
External Collaboration lets your users share Workflows, Playbooks, Vaults, and Spaces with users at other Harvey organizations.
Before you begin: Your workspace must meet the following requirements
- Both organizations must have Harvey.
- Both workspaces must be in the same data processing region (US to US, EU to EU, etc.).
- At least one Connection Admin. You must designate at least one user in your workspace who can review and approve external collaboration requests.
External Collaboration Overview
External Collaboration allows your organization to securely collaborate with other Harvey organizations and approved external participants without exposing your internal workspace.
External collaboration supports:
- Shared Spaces between organizations
- Direct sharing of supported resources
- Guest access for non-Harvey users
- Controlled approval workflows between organizations
Your organization maintains ownership, governance, and visibility over externally shared resources at all times.
Harvey supports two external collaboration models:
Collaboration Type | Description |
|---|---|
Shared Spaces | Persistent collaborative environments where organizations can share workflows, vaults, threads, Playbooks, and resources together |
Direct External Sharing | One-time or lightweight sharing of supported resources without creating a Shared Space |
Use Shared Spaces for ongoing collaboration across matters or teams. Use direct external sharing for lightweight collaboration or individual resource sharing.
Designate Connection and Space Admins
Connection admins manage resource sharing between your workspace and external connections. You can designate these capabilities at the workspace or at the relationship (individual connection) level.
External Connections
External collaboration between Harvey organizations is managed through External Connections.
External Connections:
- Represent approved relationships between organizations
- Control external sharing approvals
- Allow Connection Admins to manage collaboration requests centrally
Admins can manage External Connections in:
Settings → External Connections
Workspace Level Connection Admin
To permit workspace-wide management of connections, assign a role or user the manage external connections permission.
This permission allows a user to:
- Manage all external connections in Settings → External Connections
- Review and approve (or deny) share requests across all spaces in Spaces → Requests
- Assign relationship level, “Connection Admins” to specific connections (more on this below)
Important: This role provides organization-wide control over external sharing. Limit it to a small number of trusted users. Workspace Admins have this permission by default.
Tip: Assign this role to users responsible for governing external collaboration across your organization.
Relationship Level Connection Admin
If you’d like to restrict connection management to a specific relationship, you can choose a “connection admin” for that connection only.
This access allows a user to:
- Send and receive resources for that connection without additional approval from their workspace
- Approve resource shares for that connection. For routine Space-level actions (membership, join requests), these can be delegated to a Space Admin.
Tip: Assign this access to relationship managers or deal leads who own a specific partnership but do not require broader administrative access.
Note: The external organization’s Workspace or Connection Admin must still approve requests on their end.
Steps to Give Connection Admin Access to a Single Connection
- Go to Settings → External Connections
- Select a connection
- Adjust the access level to Connection admin.
Space Admin
Space Admin is a Space-level role sitting between Connection Admin and Space Collaborator. It lets Connection Admins delegate day-to-day management of a specific Space (such as membership, join requests, roles, and settings) to a trusted user, without granting them broader administrative access.
A Space Admin can:
- Invite and remove users within their assigned Space
- Approve or deny join requests for that Space
- Assign roles to users within that Space
- (Hosting-side only) Configure Space settings such as name, branding, and operational controls.
The user who creates a Space is automatically assigned as Space Admin. A Connection Admin (or an existing Space Admin) can assign the role to others using the Space invite modal or the External Collaboration settings page.
Tip: Use Space Admin to delegate matter-level or project-level management to a trusted person, such as a matter lead or paralegal, without expanding their permissions beyond that Space.
Note: Existing Space Leads will be automatically assigned the Space Admin role when this feature goes live.
How Sharing Requests Work in Spaces
All approval activity for your workspace lives in Spaces → Requests. Connection Admins and Workspace Admins use this page to review incoming and outgoing requests. End users use it to track the status of requests they've submitted.
External Sharing Approval Flow
When someone in your workspace shares a resource or Space with someone at another Harvey organization, the sharing request moves through a four-step approval flow:
- Requester adds context (optional). Before submitting, the requester will be prompted to add justification to their request: the use case, the people involved, and why access is needed. This context is optional and travels with the request to every reviewer on both sides.
- Outgoing approval. The request appears in your workspace under Spaces → Requests in the Action required tab, where your Connection Admin (workspace-level or relationship-level) approves or denies it.
- External recipient approval. Once your Connection Admin approves the request, the other organization's Connection Admin must review the request. The request will move to your In progress tab until the other organization responds to it.
- Access granted. Access is granted only after both organizations approve. The request moves to the Resolved tab on both sides.
Note: Internal-only Spaces do not require approval.
Managing Requests
The Requests panel is organized into three tabs:
- Action required: Requests pending your approval
- In progress: Requests you’ve approved that are still waiting on the other organization)
- Resolved: Completed requests — approved, rejected, or cancelled — that include the outcome, timestamp, and the user who resolved it. Use the Resolved tab to support audits and internal governance reviews.
Guest Accounts
Guest Accounts allow your organization to invite non-Harvey users into a Shared Space.
Guests:
- Access only the Shared Spaces they are invited to
- Authenticate through secure email verification
- Cannot access the rest of your workspace
- Cannot independently create workspace resources or tools
All guest invitations require admin approval.
Data, Privacy, and Security
Spaces support secure collaboration while protecting data residency, ownership, query privacy, and access controls.
For more details, refer to Security, Data, and Privacy for Sharing in Harvey.
Use Cases: Getting Your Team Started
Tip: Start with one or two high-value internal Spaces first — no external approvals needed — then expand to external collaboration once your team is comfortable.
Go-Live Checklist for Admins
Use this checklist to configure collaboration for your workspace.
☐ Decide your collaboration model: internal only, external with other Harvey orgs, or full collaboration with guests.
☐ Enable Use shared spaces for the users or roles who need it.
☐ If using external sharing or guest accounts: Enable Use external collaboration for relevant users, and designate at least one Connection Admin.
☐ Designate Space Admins for active Spaces: Assign a Space Admin via the Space invite modal or external collaboration settings page.
☐ Communicate to your users: Let them know which capabilities are enabled and where to find Spaces in the app.
☐ Create your first Space in the correct processing region (US, EU, or AU) — matching the region of the people you'll be collaborating with.
☐ For external sharing: Ensure the other organization's admin is also set up and ready to approve connection requests.