Businesses run on Baseline.
You should get to be good at your job.
Your sign-in, files, email, meetings, computer, and support should already make sense when the day starts. Baseline makes that the standard.
This page is written for the people who have to live with the change, not for whoever signs the agreement.
Your week, as it actually runs
Three things nobody ever asked you to put up with.
“They are still setting up my computer.”
Your first day, watching orientation videos in a borrowed chair while somebody finishes getting you ready. First impressions run in both directions.
“What is my password again?”
The rules made it impossible to remember, so it lives on a note under the keyboard. Nobody ever offered you anything better than that.
“Let me start from the beginning. Again.”
You asked about the same problem yesterday. Today it is a different person, so you explain all of it again, in the middle of a deadline.
None of this arrived as a decision. Nothing about the setup was designed for you, so the cost of it got quietly assigned to the person least able to refuse it. Then it stopped being remarkable, because nothing ever tried to make it better.
Day one
Your first day should not start with a password scavenger hunt.
You receive one company sign-in, set up a passkey, sign in to the company computer, and find the Microsoft apps and work locations your role requires. The setup steps are guided before or at the start of work.
One sign-in
You use the company sign-in and an approved passkey method instead of collecting unrelated passwords. You use a passkey instead of a password, with your face, your fingerprint, or a device PIN.
One place to work
Email, files, meetings, calendars, and Microsoft apps live in one connected Microsoft setup, so the thing you need is where you would expect it to be. You do not have to buy, install, or manage the security tools. They arrive with the company setup and run in the background. Desktop, Documents, and Pictures are saved to OneDrive, the computer drive is encrypted, and Microsoft protection checks the computer, email links, and attachments for threats.
One path for help
Start in Teams, where you already are. The request is tracked, so the next person already knows what you said and you do not start from the beginning again.
When something goes wrong
What happens when you ask for help.
- You ask in Teams. A private chat in the Baseline app, inside the tool you already have open. If Teams is unavailable, you text the Baseline number and it follows the same path.
- Somebody answers inside business hours. Initial response within 30 minutes during business hours, which are Monday through Friday, 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Mountain Time.
- The request is tracked. Most ordinary covered requests target resolution in 2 to 4 business hours, and every request receives a technician starts finding or fixing the cause within 24 business hours.
- After hours, it waits. Requests sent after hours are picked up at the next business opening. Business hours are Monday through Friday, 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Mountain Time.
What is managed, and by whom
What changes, and why.
Your company computer is connected to Baseline, configured to a common Windows standard. Baseline administers the Microsoft setup during service, which is how a problem on your machine can be diagnosed by someone who has never seen it before.
You can use the computer normally, but installing certain programs needs approval. When an approved installation genuinely needs permission to install software or change protected settings, your manager has a deliberate path for it: a temporary password, issued on purpose, for that computer, which expires. That friction is on purpose. It is what stops one afternoon click from undoing a month of work.
Two things worth being straight about
The passkey is a genuinely new habit. It is faster than what you do now and there is nothing to remember, but it is different on the first day, and you are shown how at the moment you use it rather than in advance.
Company work stays in the company’s Microsoft 365 storage rather than only on your computer. That is what makes a failed laptop an errand rather than a crisis.
Practical questions
The ones people actually ask.
Why can I not install software as an administrator?
You can use the computer normally, but installing certain programs or changing protected settings needs manager approval. The technical name for this is a standard user account. When an install is approved and genuinely needs permission to install software or change protected settings, your manager issues a temporary password for your computer, and it expires.
What happens if I lose the device with my passkey?
Your manager can start a passkey reset from the Manager Portal. Access is consistent, recoverable, and harder to compromise, which is the whole reason the recovery path exists.
What happens if my computer stops working?
A compatible computer can be connected to Baseline and set up the same way, and company work remains in the company’s Microsoft 365 storage. Baseline supports Windows and the managed Microsoft setup, not the physical hardware, so the machine itself is replaced by your company.
What should I do if Teams is unavailable?
Text the Baseline number. It follows the same path as a Teams chat, so a request never depends on the thing that broke.
What happens to my access when I leave?
Your manager removes you in the Manager Portal and access shuts down from one place, on the day it should. Company work stays with the company, in the setup where it already lives.
Questions about what is visible on a managed computer, how personal devices are handled, and what is retained are answered by your own company’s policy alongside the Baseline standard. Ask your manager, who can raise anything unclear with Baseline directly.