--- title: "Main roles and the Core badge" description: "A main role is a role created from a role template with the Main role box ticked. Talkspirit adds one to every new circle, shows it with a Core badge, and lets only main roles assign members." category: structure-governance section: roles-and-assignments tags: [admin] type: Tutorial lastUpdated: 2026-08-05 locale: en canonical: https://support.talkspirit.com/en/structure-governance/understanding-core-roles --- # Main roles and the Core badge ## Main roles and the Core badge A **main role** is a role created from a role template with the **Main role** box ticked. Talkspirit adds one to every circle created from then on, pins it to the top of that circle's role list with a **Core** badge, and allows only main roles to assign members. In every other respect it is an ordinary role: it has a purpose, domains, accountabilities, and people who fill it. The badge reads **Core** because the underlying setting is a core role. "Main role" is also one of the words your organisation can rename, so the labels on your screens may differ from the ones here. ## What ticking "Main role" changes Four things, and only these four: - **Every circle created afterwards gets the role automatically.** Talkspirit applies each main-role template the moment a new circle exists, so you never add these by hand. - **The role is pinned to the top of the circle's role list**, ahead of the others, carrying the **Core** badge. It stays pinned even when nobody fills it. - **Only a main role can be an assigner.** In a circle's settings, the assigner picker offers main roles and nothing else. - **The role cannot be flagged as hiring, and it cannot be invited into another circle** as a cross-circle role. ## What it does not change Marking a role as a main role grants nobody any extra authority. Creating a role, editing a circle and raising a proposal all depend on being a decision maker of that circle. Deleting a circle or changing its settings depends on being a circle admin. Neither of those follows from filling a main role. It does not make the role elected either. Electability is a separate box on the same template, with its own organisation-wide settings. ## Which main roles does Talkspirit provide? None. There is no ready-made set, and no built-in Lead Link, Rep Link, Facilitator or Secretary. Those are holacracy names, and where an organisation had them before, somebody created them as templates. You create the ones you want, named the way your organisation talks. Until you create at least one, a circle's settings read "No main roles defined for your organisation", and new circles arrive with no roles in them. ## Define a main role You need administrator rights, and this one is genuinely enforced: nobody else can create, edit or delete a role template. 1. In the Structure side panel, click **Structure settings** at the bottom, then **General**. 2. Open the **Role templates** tab. 3. Click **Add template**, then give it a name and a purpose. 4. Tick **Main role**, then click **Create template**. ![The Add template dialog, with the Main role checkbox first in a list of five role settings, above Electable, Manages assignments, Represents parent circle and Represents sub-circle.](/images/structure-governance/understanding-core-roles/01-add-template-main-role.png) Circles created from now on will carry the role. Circles that already exist will not. To add it to those too, reopen the template from its **Actions** menu, click **Save & apply to existing**, and tick **Also create the missing ones**. In each circle, the role then sits above the rest with its badge. ![A circle's Composition panel listing three roles, with Circle Lead first, marked Vacant and carrying a Core badge, followed by two roles that have members assigned.](/images/structure-governance/understanding-core-roles/02-core-badge-in-circle.png) ## Two things to know before you change one A circle's own settings list its main roles read-only. They are an organisation-level choice, so you change them on the template, never circle by circle. You also cannot promote a role that already exists: the only route to a main role is a template. Deleting a template deletes the template alone. The roles it already created stay in their circles, and the people assigned to them stay assigned. If you want those roles gone, delete each one in the circle that holds it. ## What's Next? - [Role Templates Overview](../structure-governance/role-templates-overview) - [Role Templates Library](../structure-governance/role-templates-library) - [Decision makers in a circle](../structure-governance/what-is-a-decision-maker-of-a-circle) - [Circle Admins](../structure-governance/who-are-circle-admins) - [Holding an election for an elected role](../structure-governance/how-to-hold-an-election-for-an-elected-role)