This article will guide you through the process of using assessments to evaluate your client's IT environment.

Creating an Assessment

1. Select a client from the Client picker under your account name to view their dashboard.
   
    
2. Click Assessments in the left panel of the client’s dashboard.
    
3. Click +New assessment in the upper right corner of the Assessment Page.
    
4. Enter the following details and click Next:
   • Template - Choose a template for this assessment.
   • Title - The name of the assessment
   • Performed by - The name of the person performing the assessment.
   • Assessment Date - The date the assessment is being performed.
   • Description - A brief description about the purpose of this assessment
      
5. Click Create. The new assessment will open, ready to be filled out.
    
6. Review the categories and Items
   Assessment items are organized into categories. Each item shows the response options available.
7. Adjust the Display settings
   Click Display to choose how you would like to view the assessment:
   • Comfortable/Compact
     Affects how the assessment items and categories are displayed.
   • Hide Answered Questions
     Displays only questions that have not yet had a response.
   • Expand/Collapse Categories
     Expands or Collapses all categories, making it easier to view them all at once.
   • Expand/Collapse Questions (Available in the Comfortable view)
     Shows or hides question response options
   • Expand/Collapse additional items
     Shows or hides Scoring guidance and Remediation tips for each question
   • Filter by Tag
     Allows you to show or hide items marked with a specific tag.
8. Select responses for each item
   For each item, choose the response that best matches the situation from the available options listed.
9. Use item actions as needed
   Click the + button to view additional actions
   • Additional Answer
     If the responses provided in the template don't cover a particular response, use this option to add a different answer.
   • Public comment
     Add a public comment to this item (Will be visible to clients when sharing this assessment with them).
   • Internal comment
     Add an internal comment to the item (Visible only to your team, and not shared with the client).
   • Tag
     Add a tag to the item. See Managing Assessment tags for details on creating new tags.
   • Link to Initiative
     Link the item to an existing initiative, or create a new one (from scratch or from a template) and link it. See Creating and linking Initiatives for details.
   • Link to ticket 
     Link the Item to a ticket.
10. View the category score
    A score is displayed next to each category name and updates automatically as you select responses.
11. Mark the assessment as complete
    Click Mark Complete at the top of the screen. The assessment will show as completed on the Assessments page.

After an assessment is marked as completed, it becomes read-only. For instructions on making changes to a completed assessment, see Editing a completed assessment.

Progress is saved automatically as you work. You can leave and return to the assessment at any time before or after marking it as complete.

Duplicating an assessment

Duplicating an assessment creates a new assessment based on the existing one, using the same template. This is useful for recurring reviews where most of the information hasn't changed, or when you want to keep the original assessment intact while working on an updated version.

To duplicate an assessment:

1. Click the contextual menu icon from the action column of the Assessments list next to the assessment you want to duplicate.
    
2. Select Duplicate. The Assessment duplication modal will appear.
    
3. In the Assessment Duplication modal, enter the information that will be carried over to the duplicate
   • New Title
     The title of the new assessment (Defaults to appending "(copy)" to the end of the original assessment name
   • Performed by
     The user assigned to the duplicate assessment.
   • Assessment date
     The date that will appear as the duplicate's assessment date.
   • Include responses
     Check this box to include all responses from the original assessment.
   • Include private comments
     Check this box to include all internal comments from the original assessment.
   • Include public comments
     Check this box to include all public comments from the original assessment.
4. Click Duplicate to create the duplicate assessment. (Or Cancel to leave the modal without creating a duplicate)

Follow up with tasks

1. Open the assessment and find the question you want to follow up on.
2. Open the question's actions and choose the task action.
3. Create a task for the question, or search for and link an existing task for the same client.
4. Open the linked task beside the question to review or continue the work.

Task actions follow your Client Focus access and task permissions. Tasks from another client cannot be linked to this question.

Task links keep assessment findings connected to follow-up work without creating a PSA ticket or initiative for every item.

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