Getting Started

Getting Started with Gridavera

Audience
SharePoint/Microsoft 365 users/admins at a company that just installed the Gridavera Office add-in (or is considering installing it).
Time to value
~15 minutes to a first working view; 30–60 minutes for a fully configured deployment.

What Gridavera does

Gridavera turns Microsoft Excel into a controlled, multi-user planning surface that writes directly into SharePoint lists. Your finance, operations, commercial, and HR teams edit familiar spreadsheets; Gridavera enforces row-level and column-level permissions, validates entries with dropdowns, and submits changes back to SharePoint in real time.

All your data stays inside your Microsoft 365 tenant. Gridavera’s cloud stores your subscription details, configuration and activity records, never your SharePoint rows.

Prerequisites

You needWhy
Microsoft 365 with Excel (Web, Windows, or Mac)Host for the task pane
A SharePoint siteWhere your planning data lives
Site Owner rights on that site (or “Manage Lists” permission)Gridavera creates its configuration lists here
Global admin on your M365 tenant (one-time)To approve the add-in organisation-wide via Microsoft 365 admin consent

Set up in five steps

1

Install the add-in

Option A: Self-serve (fastest)
  1. Open Excel (Web, Windows, or Mac).
  2. From the Home ribbon, click Add-ins → Get Add-ins.
  3. Search for “Gridavera” in the store.
  4. Click Add.
Option B: Organisation-wide via Microsoft 365 admin center
  1. Go to admin.microsoft.com.
  2. Navigate to Settings → Integrated apps → Get apps.
  3. Find Gridavera and click Get it now.
  4. Choose who to deploy it to (specific users, groups, or the entire organisation).
  5. Complete the consent flow.

After installation, the Gridavera button appears on the Excel Home ribbon for every user you deployed to.

2

First sign-in

  1. Open Excel and click the Gridavera button on the Home ribbon. The task pane opens.
  2. Gridavera picks up your Microsoft 365 identity automatically via single sign-on — no separate login.
  3. If your organisation has never used Gridavera before, you’ll see a Welcome to Gridavera screen.
If you see “Administrator approval needed”

Some tenants require tenant-admin consent before any user can sign in. Gridavera shows a dedicated screen with a one-click Open admin consent page button.

  1. If you’re a global admin: click the button, approve, then click I’ve approved — retry.
  2. If you’re not: click Copy link for admin, send the link to your IT administrator, then retry after they’ve approved.

You only do this once per organisation.

3

Start your free trial

From the Welcome screen:

  1. Click Start 14-day free trial. No credit card needed.
  2. Paste the URL of the SharePoint site where Gridavera should create its configuration. Example: https://contoso.sharepoint.com/sites/planning.
  3. Click Continue.

Gridavera provisions its configuration lists on that site (ConfigGeneral, ConfigRoles, dimUsers, and so on), seeds a few default rows, and registers you as the tenant admin. The whole step takes under a minute. When it’s done, you’ll see a You’re all set screen with a link to open the Gridavera admin panel.

4

Configure your first view

Open the admin panel (linked from the plugin or directly at admin.gridavera.com). You’ll see a deployment wizard. The minimum to get a working view is:

  1. Dimension lists — tell Gridavera which SharePoint lists hold your reference data (regions, departments, cost centres, etc.). Gridavera reads them to power validation dropdowns and row-level filters.
  2. Transaction lists — tell Gridavera which SharePoint list holds the data your users will actually edit (e.g., Budget2026, Forecast, Headcount).
  3. Views — define saved queries on each transaction list: columns, filters, sort, editable vs. read-only.
  4. Roles — create roles like BudgetEditor, SalesViewer, HRAdmin. Each role controls access at the view level.
  5. Users — add the people who’ll use Gridavera. Assign roles and optional dimension filters (e.g., “Maria only sees rows where Region = EMEA”).

Each step has a preview and a “try it now” link that opens the plugin against your current config so you can verify before moving on.

5

Load and submit from Excel

Back in Excel, click Refresh in the Gridavera task pane to pick up your new config.

  1. Pick a view from the dropdown.
  2. Click Load. Your rows appear in the sheet. Editable cells are highlighted; read-only cells are locked.
  3. Edit values directly. Dropdowns enforce valid entries. Required fields are validated inline.
  4. Click Submit. Changes write back to SharePoint. You’ll see a success banner with a count of updated rows; any failures are listed with details.

Your users can repeat this cycle without touching the admin panel.

Common “what now?” situations

I edited a row but the user can’t see it

Row-level security: the user likely has a dimension filter that excludes that row. Check Admin panel → Users → Edit → Dimension Filters.

I added a new column in SharePoint — how does Gridavera pick it up?

In the admin panel, open the view, click Edit Columns, and add the new field. Gridavera never touches your SharePoint schema — you decide when new fields are available to plugin users.

The user says “Your account has not been added”

The tenant is registered but the user isn’t in the dimUsers list. Add them in Admin panel → Users with at least one role.

The user says “Your Gridavera trial has ended”

Your trial ran out. Subscribe from Admin panel → Subscription, or extend the trial via your Gridavera ops contact.

The add-in doesn’t load in Excel Desktop but works in Excel Online

Excel Desktop has its own cache. Close and reopen Excel. If the problem persists, go to File → Options → Trust Center → Trusted Add-in Catalogs and make sure Office is allowed to load side-loaded add-ins from the web.

Security

Security model at a glance

1. Your data stays in your tenant. Gridavera’s backend never stores your SharePoint rows. The Backup feature (opt-in) stores encrypted configuration snapshots, including your user list and access settings, not your transaction rows.
2. Row-level security. Assign each user one or more dimension filter values. They only see rows where at least one matching value is present.
Column-level security. Mark columns as read-only for specific roles. Editable cells are highlighted in Excel.
3. Role-based access. Roles combine view-level access with action-level permissions (Load, Submit, Append, Unlock).
4. Optional encryption. On the Enterprise tier, sensitive text columns can be AES-256 encrypted. Keys live in Azure Key Vault, scoped to your tenant.
5. Optional “Secure Write” mode. On sensitive sites, writes are routed through a dedicated server endpoint using Graph API so plugin users only need SharePoint read access.

Ready to roll it out?

Pick your install path, or reach out if you get stuck — we usually reply within one business day.

Scroll to top