Creating and Assigning Staff Roles

Last updated June 2026  ·  5 min read

You can't run a tournament alone, and you shouldn't hand your director login to a volunteer either. Taikai App's staff system gives each helper their own account, a role, and exactly the permissions their job needs.

Built-in roles

Four member roles exist out of the box:

• Coach — registers and manages athletes from their dojo (see Coach and team registration access)
• Judge — officiates; can be seated on mats and score from the judge device
• Staff — general volunteers: check-in desk, table workers, runners
• Parent — guardians linked to competitors

Inviting by email

The fastest way to staff up: invite people by email from the manager, choosing their role. If the invitee already has a Taikai App account, they're added to your tournament immediately as approved. If not, they receive an invitation email with a link — they create an account, and the invitation attaches to it.

Self-applications

People can also come to you. The registration page offers role cards — Competitor, Coach, Judge, Staff — and anyone selecting a non-athlete role submits an application to your tournament. Applications land in the Approvals panel of your dashboard, filterable by pending, approved, and declined, with Approve and Decline buttons per applicant.

Custom roles

Built-in roles say what someone is; custom roles say what they can do. Under Settings → Staff Roles you'll find the Staff Roles & Permissions panel:

• 1
  Name the role e.g. "Head Judge", "Check-in Desk", "Awards Table".
• 2
  Pick its permissions Any combination of the six permissions — see Available permissions explained.
• 3
  Create the role Click Create Role. The role is now assignable to any approved member.

Assigning roles to members

The Member Role Assignments section lists every approved member with a dropdown to attach a custom role. From that moment their account carries the role's permissions in your tournament — and only in your tournament. Roles are per-event: your head judge holds no power in anyone else's tournament, and vice versa.

For mat assignments — which judge sits where — see Running multiple tatamis.