HomeA key part of our work at Wazoku centers around enabling our customers to improve their operations. That mindset of relentless development is something we aim to apply to our platform as well. In this piece, I’m going to discuss recent updates and upcoming changes that we’re making to the platform, aimed at improving functionality, capability, and performance for all users.
In three sections, I’ll recap the recently released updates that are already live on the platform (or soon will be), officially launch our new ‘Product Delights’ program, and look at the functionality we’re working on for future releases.
Recent Releases
To begin with, let’s look at the developments that we’ve made recently which are either currently live on the platform or will be going live shortly.
Firstly, we have a new Discover Card. We’ve introduced a sleeker design that will create consistency across the entire platform. It also makes 'Preview Mode’ the default Idea view, with an alternative option to go to the full Idea page. Alongside this, we have introduced a capability to view cards in a list view. This allows these users to see more information at a glance, such as the “stage” and “status” of an idea and is particularly useful for Challenge Managers to quickly survey the ideas in a Challenge.
Elsewhere, we’ve recently introduced the ability to configure gamification at different levels for our Challenge Managers and Admins. These users have requested the ability to have entire Idea Spaces and Co-Creation Communities where there are no points awarded, and this is now possible.
Finally, we’ve also introduced the ability to add groups at a community level. Historically, it’s been possible to use global groups at a community level. Now, in addition to the global groups, community admins are also able to add groups at the community level that can be used across all parent and child communities.
Product Delights
I’d now like to turn attention to something that we’ve recently launched. Led by our Customer Experience team, 'Product Delights' allow us to make incremental changes to the platform, making life easier for our users.
Generally, these will be adjustments that address feedback that we receive on little details that make idea management harder than it needs to be. They are updates to the product which will hopefully add some delight to the daily routine.
- Mistaken Rejection – we've made it possible for Challenge Managers and Admins to ‘unreject’ ideas without having to request this from us. Similarly, if an idea was rightly rejected in the past but has now become relevant, this functionality makes it possible to revive that proposal.
- Idea IDs – our platform now ensures that idea evaluators receive email notifications with the Idea ID in the subject. This allows them to see information immediately that previously they would have to open emails and click links to access.
- Community Member Options – thanks to this Delight, when users create a new community, they control when invited members are notified. This means that those invited don’t see the community ahead of time, limiting potential confusion.
- Idea Creator – it’s now possible for Admins and Challenge Managers to update the Idea Creator without having to raise this with us. Sometimes an idea is submitted on someone’s behalf, so this functionality allows you to rectify this without needing our input.
Future Functionality
Having introduced some of the more imminent changes we’re making to the platform, I’d now like to look at the updates we’re currently working on.
To address feedback around data and analytics capabilities, we’re embedding an entirely new analytics platform into Wazoku. This new capability will enable admin users to configure all the data points which are important to them.
This platform will allow for the creation of reports and visualizations. These include the embedding of content, such as Challenges, Ideas, or User Profiles so that users can engage with the content from the dashboard itself. Users will also be able to create pulses, a feature that sends notifications out when a milestone is achieved.
We’re also making developments in our Data Science and AI engines. Whilst we currently support recommendations for existing ideas and communities, we’re looking to extend this further so that recommendations for people to collaborate with are also possible.
To drive more data-informed decision-making, we’re working on the process of idea clustering, which will identify common themes or topics that are being discussed. The purpose of this is to ensure evaluation is consistent and that new Challenges can be run on topics that may have been overlooked.
Also, we’re aiming to introduce more consistency to our UX design. The language, look, and navigation of the platform are key areas of focus. Unifying the platform along these lines should make it easier to drive participation from all areas of an organization, whilst our increased supply of guides and instructional material should ensure users are more self-sufficient.
Finally, we’re aiming to enhance the site configuration. This is mostly for Admin users and aims to make it easier to configure individual experience with the platform. A key area in which this will help deals with language. We want to give the option to users to select which languages need supporting, and which don’t. This avoids any occurrence of people changing the platform settings into a language that no one in an organization uses.
As the quarters roll by, more configurations will be added, gradually giving more control to Admins over how the site is managed.
Conclusion
I hope that these changes will be exciting for all our customers, as we value the suggestions of our users to make Wazoku even better for them. As ever, if there’s a feature of the site that you believe we need to develop, please feel free to let us know.
