--- title: "New Operator Quick Start" source: /gc-surge/operator/new-operator-quick-start locale: en updated: 2026-09-23 --- ## Summary This guide is for operators who have received a GC Surge invitation email. It covers how to activate your account, what you will see after your first login, and how to handle alarms in your first shift. Covers: Activating Your Account, Your First Login, Handling Your First Shift, Your Performance Metrics. ## **Who This Page Is For** You received an invitation email from your organisation’s GC Surge Super Admin. Your role is **Operator** — you handle live alarms during shifts using the ZenMode processing screen. You do not manage cameras, users, or platform settings — those are Super Admin tasks. This guide gets you from invitation to your first closed alarm. ## **Step 1 — Activate your account** *(~3 minutes)* 1. Check your inbox for an email from **noreply@nxgen.io** with the subject **“You’ve been invited to GC Surge”**. Open the email and click **Set Password & Verify Email**. This opens the password setup page. 2. On the **Reset your password** page, set a password that meets all five requirements:8+ charactersUppercase letter (A–Z)Lowercase letter (a–z)Symbol (e.g. !@#$%^&\*)Number (0–9)Click **Reset Password**. You are redirected directly to the Account Setup Wizard — no separate sign-in or confirmation screen appears. 3. The Account Setup Wizard guides you through three steps, then confirms:**Welcome** — review your Operator role info and choose your preferred language. Click **Get started**.**Your profile** — confirm your display name (this is how teammates see you in the app) and optionally click **Add photo**. Click **Continue**.**Your sites** — review the locations you will be monitoring. Click **Continue**.**All set** — a confirmation screen shows: Profile saved, Sites linked to your shift, Alerts routed to your queue. Click **Enter Surge**. 4. You land on the **Alarm Center** when done. All subsequent logins go directly to the Alarm Center. ![Screenshot 2026-06-25 111953.png](/api/media/file/Screenshot-2026-06-25-111953.png) ## **Step 2 — What you will see after login** The left sidebar shows only the modules available to your role: - **Alarm Center** — your main working screen. This is where you find, claim, and enter sites during a shift. - **Operator Performance** — alarm trends and your personal performance data. Useful for reviewing your own results after a shift. Your profile — name, email address, and role — is available under **Settings** (the gear icon at the bottom of the sidebar), on the **Personal Information** tab. ## **Step 3 — Handle your first shift** All alarm processing happens through **ZenMode**, the alarm processing screen. Here is the sequence for every shift: **Find a site to work on** 1. Open **Alarm Center** from the left sidebar. 2. Click **Start Shift** in the top right corner. A *“Shift started successfully”* banner confirms your shift is active. 3. Check **Queued Sites Assigned to You** first — these are sites your Super Admin pre-assigned to you for this shift. If this panel is empty, move to the next step. 4. In the **Sites Unassigned to Operators** table, find a site with active alarms. The table is sorted by most recent activity — the site with the most recent alarm appears first. 5. Find a site where the **Lock status** shows **Available** — if it shows a different state the site is already held by another operator. Click **Assign to me** in the Actions column. ZenMode opens and the site is automatically assigned to you — the site status changes to **In Progress**, it appears as your Picked Site when you return to Alarm Center, and the **Close all alarms** button becomes available in the ZenMode toolbar. **Process alarms in ZenMode** 1. ZenMode opens automatically after you claim a site. The screen shows a **camera grid** at the top and a **timeline** below it. Each camera tile shows its event count (for example, *22 Events*). Green dots on the timeline represent open alarms for each sensor row. 2. Use the toolbar controls to manage your view:**True alarms only** — hides false-alarm camera feeds so you focus on real events.**Show closed** — toggles closed alarms on/off the timeline.**Focus Zone** — activates a time window on the timeline (for example, 1 minute). Alarms inside the zone become your current working set. The zone can be live (follows new alarms) or pinned (stays on a fixed range).**PAUSE** — freezes the live stream so you can review without new alarms pushing in.**FOCUS NOW** — jumps the Focus Zone back to the current live position. 3. To close alarms, use one of three methods:Click **CLOSE ALL ALARMS** to close all open alarms on the site at once.Enable the Focus Zone, then click **Close ZenMode Alarms (n)** to close only the alarms inside the zone — the count in the button follows the zone as you move it.Click a camera tile to open the alarm detail view. It shows the recorded clip from the moment of the alarm and then plays on through the camera’s other open alarms, with **ALARM n OF m** marking your place. Click **Pause** to hold on one while you look at it, and **Play** to carry on.Close from that dialog with **Close current alarm** for the one on screen, or **Close all alarms** for every open alarm on that camera. 4. The **Close Alarms** dialog opens. Review the summary — site name, alarms to be closed, true/false alarm split, time range, and sensor — then:Select a **Closure tag** (required) from the dropdown. If the tag you need is not there, type it and choose **\+ Create** to add it.Add **Closure notes** (optional) for any extra context.Click **Confirm**. A *“Alarms closed successfully.”* banner confirms the action. 5. When done with the site, click **Unassign** or **Back To New Alarms** to release it back to the queue. Closing all alarms does not automatically release the site — you must unassign manually. 6. Claim the next site from the Sites Unassigned to Operators table and repeat. 7. When your shift is complete, click **End Shift**. Your [Operator Performance](/operator/operator-performance) page loads automatically — showing your full shift metrics and charts. For the full ZenMode interface guide including keyboard shortcuts and alarm detail views, see [ZenMode — Operator Monitoring](/operator/zenmode-operator-monitoring). ![Screenshot 2026-06-25 131336.png](/api/media/file/Screenshot-2026-06-25-131336.png) ## **Your performance metrics** After your shift ends, open **Operator Performance** from the sidebar to review your Shift Performance Summary. It shows how many alarms you handled and a breakdown of how you used closure tags compared to your personal average and all other operators. ## **Tips for your first week** - **Claim one site at a time.** Close or release a site before claiming the next one — holding multiple sites without handling them blocks other operators from picking them up. - **Always select a closure tag.** Tags are how the platform and your manager understand what is happening across sites. Closing without a tag loses that context permanently. - **Your APT will improve naturally.** The first few shifts feel slower as you learn the interface. ZenMode is designed to speed up over time as the workflow becomes familiar.