Email Delegation in Organizations: Giving Access Without Giving Away the Keys

Delegation lets one person send, read, or manage email on behalf of another account without ever knowing that account's password — an executive assistant sending on behalf of a CEO, a support lead covering a manager's inbox during leave, a team member managing a shared calendar tied to a mailbox. Done properly, it's a clean way to extend access. Done by sharing a password directly, it's a security problem waiting to surface.

Why password sharing is the wrong default

The most common shortcut, still surprisingly widespread, is simply handing over a mailbox's actual login credentials to whoever needs access. This breaks basic accountability immediately — once two people share a login, there's no way to know from the account's activity alone who actually sent a given message or made a given change. It also means that if the delegate leaves the team or the relationship changes, the only fix is a full password reset, which disrupts everyone else who might legitimately need continued access.

It also multiplies your attack surface for no good reason. Every additional person who knows a shared password is another person whose device, personal habits, or own account security failures can compromise the mailbox — and unlike proper delegation, there's no way to revoke just one person's access without resetting things for everyone.

How proper delegation actually works

Most business email platforms support delegation as a first-class feature rather than a workaround: granting a specific user permission to send as, send on behalf of, or view another mailbox, without ever exposing that mailbox's own credentials. The distinction between "send as" and "send on behalf of" matters more than people expect — "send as" makes the message appear to come directly from the delegated account with no visible indication a delegate sent it, while "send on behalf of" shows both names, making it clear who actually took the action. For executive support, "send as" is usually preferred for a seamless experience; for shared team accounts, "send on behalf of" often preserves useful accountability.

This is a different pattern from a true shared mailbox, where multiple people access one common inbox as equals rather than one person delegating limited access to their own personal account. Choosing the right one depends on whether you're extending an individual's account temporarily or building a permanent team-facing inbox.

Scoping delegation to what's actually needed

Full delegation — send, read, delete, manage folders — is rarely what a situation actually calls for. An assistant scheduling meetings on a manager's behalf typically needs calendar and send access, not permission to permanently delete messages or change account security settings. Most platforms let you scope delegated permissions narrowly, and it's worth taking the extra few minutes to do that rather than granting broad access because it's the default option in the setup screen.

This matters more for executive accounts specifically, where the account is a higher-value target and broader delegated access means more people whose own account security effectively becomes part of the executive's attack surface.

Auditing and revoking delegation over time

Delegated access has a way of quietly outliving its original purpose. An assistant who covered for a manager during a two-week leave often keeps that access indefinitely unless someone deliberately revokes it. Over time, this leaves accounts with a longer list of delegates than anyone currently remembers granting, each one a small extension of the account's attack surface.

A reasonable delegation review process

• Review delegated access on sensitive accounts (executives, finance, IT admin) at least quarterly
• Remove delegation immediately when a role or reporting relationship changes, not at the next scheduled review
• Scope delegated permissions to what the task actually requires rather than granting full access by default
• Prefer "send on behalf of" over "send as" wherever accountability matters more than a seamless appearance
• Document who has delegated access to which accounts somewhere your IT or security team can actually check

Delegation as part of a broader access strategy

Email delegation works best as one piece of a deliberate access control approach, alongside security awareness practices and strong account protections like MFA on every account that grants or receives delegated access. A well-scoped, well-audited delegation setup gives teams the flexibility they need without turning every shared responsibility into a shared password. If your organization is still relying on shared logins to cover these situations, migrating to proper delegation is a worthwhile project — MailDog's documentation covers how delegated access is configured across common setups.