Bringing clarity to your software stack shouldn’t take a spreadsheet army. So we’re here to help bring you clarity and begin simplifying your SaaS chaos. Sheaf gives finance leaders a faster way to see who’s using what, what it costs, and how to optimize it.
This guide will help you create your account, connect your workspace, import your people and apps, and view your entire SaaS landscape — no technical lift required.
1. Creating Your Sheaf Account
Head over to the Sheaf staging environment, enter your work email, create a secure password, and you’re in.
2. Choosing Your Connection Method
You’ll be prompted to choose how you want to connect:
- Google Workspace – Fastest for Google-based organizations
- Microsoft Azure – Seamless for Microsoft environments
- Manual Setup – A flexible option where you add apps and users yourself. It takes a bit more time upfront, but still delivers the same visibility and tracking
💡 Quick tip: SSO (Google or Microsoft) gives you the clearest picture of your SaaS landscape with minimal effort. But if you’re focused solely on contracts and costs, manual mode works great too.
3. Connecting Your Workspace
Here’s what to expect depending on your selection:
If you chose Google Workspace
You must be a Super Admin or have delegated admin access to allow Sheaf to fetch users and apps. Without this, you’ll hit a permissions error.
If you chose Microsoft Azure
Make sure you have Microsoft Entra ID P1 (formerly Azure AD Premium E1). Without it, Sheaf can’t discover your apps or map your access.
For more on integrating your SaaS applications through SSO, visit our Help with Google Workspace SSO or Help with Microsoft SSO articles.
If you chose Manual Setup
This path takes a few extra minutes, but gives you complete financial oversight without needing IT to weigh in.
- Select ‘New Application’ -> ‘Create Custom Application’
- Add:
- App basics: name, website, purpose
- Contract info: start date, renewal frequency, notification lead time
- Spend details: monthly/annual cost, currency, billing type
- Ownership: assign primary and secondary owners (great for finance accountability)
For more on manual setup, see our Guide to Adding and Managing Users or Guide to Adding and Managing Applications.
4. Importing Your Users
If you’ve connected via SSO, Sheaf automatically pulls in your directory. As part of onboarding, you can assign users to specific applications right away.
You can also manage user access on a per-user or per-app basis anytime after onboarding.
5. Discovering Your Applications
Sheaf automatically detects apps associated with your users (SSO only). For manual setups, you’ll add each app manually — but the end result is the same.
Sheaf provides a clear list of applications linked to users in your directory. This helps reveal tools that may have been overlooked or under-tracked in previous internal systems.
6. Mapping User Access
Review the selected users and the applications detected from your connected directory. Only apps the user has logged into and is not yet linked to will be available for synchronization.
This step ensures your data is accurate and avoids duplicate app-user relationships.
7. Final Review
Double-check users, apps, and permissions. Once confirmed, your Sheaf experience is set to begin!