User Permissions

I'm trying to create the concept of a "department". The department is a major branch of the website, for example

 www.mysite.com/department

I want the department owner to have normal owner authority of their own department, but not of any other departments, nor of the website root.

What I've done is created a role "department manager", which mostly denies them everything. However, for the specific user(s) which owns their individual department, I create an allow for their subfolder to the root.

I'm having trouble isolating them to their department, and if I deny them to the root, then the "pages" page will not load at all. Can anybody help with this?

Thanks

Joe Bowen, Voicetext

Hello Eileen,

Please check and ensure that you have the role/s added under:  
Pages > (on the right side) Permissions for all pages > "Add widgets and layout elements to the page".

Than set the permissions needed (Allow or Deny) for the group pages/departments.

Tutorial about how to grant permissions for pages is available here:
http://docs.sitefinity.com/tutorial-grant-permissions-for-pages