Three different things
They are easy to confuse, so it is worth being precise:
- Assignee. One person, the owner. It shows in their My Work.
- Watchers. Anyone else who should follow it. They also see it in My Work, marked as watched, and they can add notes.
- Mention. A one-off "look at this" inside a note. It notifies, but it does not make anyone responsible.
Rule of thumb: assign the person who must act, add watchers who need to know, mention someone you need an answer from.
@Tom Hale can you check whether the refund actually left the account?
Priya Nair · 2 hours ago
Watchers see the item in My Work and are notified when they are added. Mentioning someone notifies them too.
Assigning
Cases, tasks, reviews and inbox conversations can all have an assignee. Pick one from the selector on the item. Reassigning moves it out of the old owner's My Work and into the new one's.
Watchers
Add watchers from the item itself. They are notified when added, and the item then appears in their My Work. Watching is a good fit for a manager who wants sight of a complaint without taking it over, or a second person covering a shift.
@mentions in notes
Type @ in a note and pick a teammate. Their name becomes a chip in the saved note, and they get a notification that links straight back to it. Mentions show under Mentioned in My Work and under the Mentions tab of your notifications.
You can only mention people who are members of that business, which is also why a mention never leaks a note to someone who should not see it.
Who can be assigned
Anyone who can act on the item. View-only members can be mentioned and can watch, but assigning work to someone who cannot reply to it only hides the work. See roles and permissions.
Tasks and due dates
A task is the only item type with a due date, which is what makes the Most pressing sort useful. Add one from a contact, a company or a case, and it stays linked to that record so the context travels with it.