Everything you need to know before you start, and nothing you do not. This page explains the honest timings, what is genuinely required, and what you can safely leave until next week.
#01How long it really takes
Most institutions reach a usable workspace in 8–11 minutes. That figure is the whole journey from opening the activation email to completing one real task.
| Part | Time | Can you skip it? |
|---|---|---|
| Secure the owner account | About 2–3 minutes | No. Email verification, sign-in and legal acceptance are required. |
| Quick Launch | About 6–8 minutes | Partly. Its shortest route is about 5–6 minutes. |
| Team invitations | About 2 minutes | Yes. About 30 seconds to do later. |
| Data import | About 1 minute to choose | Yes. Importing never blocks launch. |
| Setup Centre tasks | Varies | Yes. None of them blocks normal use. |
About the 5–6 minute figure. You may see 5–6 minutes mentioned. That is the shortest Quick Launch route only — what Quick Launch takes when you skip team invitations and data import. It is not the total onboarding time, because it excludes securing your account, legal acceptance and provisioning. The honest total is 8–11 minutes.
#02Two zones, one journey
Technically there are two security zones. To you it should feel like one continuous flow launched from your email.
- Secure activation — before you are let in. Academyship verifies your email address, you create a sign-in, you set up multi-factor authentication, and you record the legal acceptance that applies to your institution. This part cannot be skipped, because owner accounts control student data, billing and permissions.
- Quick Launch — inside your new workspace. You confirm your institution’s essentials, seed your academic structure from a template, choose where your team starts, optionally invite colleagues and choose a data path, then complete one real task.
- Setup Centre — permanently available. Branding, fees, grading, attendance rules, portals, integrations and everything else lives here. It never blocks you and tasks can be assigned to colleagues.
#03What is mandatory
- Verifying your work email. Clicking the link is not enough on its own — you confirm with an explicit action, so email security scanners cannot consume your link.
- Creating a secure sign-in. A password of 12 to 128 characters — length is the rule, not a mixture of symbols. See Passwords for the full rule.
- Multi-factor authentication on paid, trial, Institutional Annual and Enterprise plans. On Community you may wait up to 72 hours, with nine actions locked until it is on, including inviting staff and importing real data. See Account security.
- Legal acceptance. You accept the Terms of Service and the Acceptable Use Policy and acknowledge the Privacy Policy. Nothing is pre-ticked, and the exact wording depends on whether your institution is self-service or already has a signed agreement.
#04What you can skip
Every one of these is resumable, and skipping is never treated as completing.
- Inviting your team. Doing it later takes about 30 seconds.
- Choosing a data path. Start empty and decide whenever you like.
- The first-success task. Recommended, but not enforced.
- Every Setup Centre task. Each one tells you the consequence of postponing it, so you can make an informed choice.
#05What you can change later
Before any consequential decision, Academyship shows you a change-risk label so you know what you are committing to.
| Label | Meaning | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| Can change later | A normal administration setting. Change it whenever you like. | Campus names and addresses, institution display name, hierarchy level names, starting sections |
| Changes need care | Changing it after real data exists affects dates, records or reports. | Time zone, academic year dates, calendar structure, attendance basis |
| Support-assisted later | Other systems depend on it, so support helps you change it safely. | Workspace address, legal entity and ABN |
#06What your plan changes
Your plan sets real limits. Academyship tells you about them before you hit them, never at submit. The limits themselves come from your plan or your Order Form, so the exact figures for your institution are the ones shown in your workspace.
| Plan | Staff accounts | Campuses | Notable onboarding behaviour |
|---|---|---|---|
| Community | 3 total, including you | As set out in your plan | Multi-factor authentication may be deferred for 72 hours |
| Essentials | As set out in your plan | As set out in your plan | Module availability follows your plan |
| Growth | As set out in your plan | As set out in your plan | Module availability follows your plan |
| Professional | As set out in your plan | As set out in your plan | Module availability follows your plan |
| Institutional Annual | As set out in your Order Form | As set out in your Order Form | A guided setup session is arranged with your implementation contact |
| Enterprise | As set out in your Order Form | As set out in your Order Form | Uses the implementation hub, not the self-service wizard |
Nothing you enter is thrown away. If you supply an RTO or CRICOS code and the related features are not part of your plan, the code is recorded with your workspace and the screen says plainly that the features are not included. If your plan changes later, the onboarding team confirms what that means for them.
#07Where your progress is saved
Finished steps are saved to your account as you go, so you can stop and pick up where you left off — on any device, not only the one you started on. You will see a Saved indicator in the top bar with the time of the last save.
If you leave, your workspace opens with a small Continue setup card rather than a blocking screen. If you come back to onboarding, a Welcome back banner tells you where you left off.
What is never saved. Your password, the multi-factor codes you type, your recovery codes and your activation token are never stored: they are not written to your saved progress, to your browser, to analytics or to a web address. Your password is sent securely over an encrypted connection to create your account, and it is not kept afterwards.
#08If something goes wrong
| Situation | What to do |
|---|---|
| Your activation link expired | Request a new one. Your institution details and workspace reservation are still saved, and you never re-enter the pricing form. Links last 72 hours and work once. |
| You used the wrong email address | Change it from the expired-link screen. You do not need to re-enter institution details. |
| Provisioning is taking a long time | You can safely leave. Academyship emails you when it finishes and gives you a reference. You will never be asked to resubmit the pricing form. |
| The previous owner has left | Do not ask them to forward a link. Use the institutional recovery route in Account security, which verifies your authority. |
| You hit a plan limit | You are told before you enter data, with the exact included and used counts. Upgrading preserves everything you have entered. |
#09Keep reading
These four guides cover the whole onboarding journey.