Want to resolve features but allow others to comment...
Hi All,
I'm at day 6 of my tender test -- So far I've become quite
impressed -- There have been a few things that were confusing at
first but as I've wrapped my head around it I'm beginning to see
the advantages of tender.
My most recent thing involves the use of the 'resolve' feature -- I may be atypical in this but I've always taken the approach in support that if I respond to a customer with an idea, feedback, or suggestion that I'm done from my end -- I've sort of considered it closed unless the customer comes back with new information or my ideas don't help. (I do keep issues open if I have action to follow up on however)
if you use the email portal for tender this works great -- I respond and close the issue… if the customer emails back it get's re-opened -- Perfect!
The issue is the web interface -- If a customer provides inputs via the web and I respond and close then the whole discussion is closed so he (or no one) can go back in and make a comment.
What I'd like is something between 'open' and 'closed' for public discussions (maybe three states, "Closed" means no comments allowed, "open" means support staff needs to respond and "enabled" means it's marked internally as closed but people can still comment on it, any comments moving it back to 'Open')
I do this because i'm obsessed with keeping my open issues list down to zero.
So does this make sense? Perhaps there is a way to do this within Tender already but i've not come across it.
Thanks
-John
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Support Staff 1 Posted by Courtenay on Mar 10, 2010 @ 07:53 AM
Haha, yeah it does. Resolve and shut-them-up (we call that the
37signals style) and resolve but leave it open for discussion. Also,
some discussions just don't have resolution (like that old
ex-girlfriend of mine) - someone might have an idea, and you thank
them but let it sit. You don't want to "resolve" something like that,
as such, but you also don't want it lurking there in your inbox.
We're redoing the states of discussions in the near future, and this
will definitely have some influence. Thanks! (marking as sort of
resolved, but open for comment.. hah!)
2 Posted by holder10 on Jul 13, 2010 @ 09:57 PM
I like how you didn't resolve this discussion. ;)
Anyway, I always felt the same way (both when using it as an customer on other products and now considering using it) and searched for it to see if anyone else made that suggestion.
Turns out someone did and I just wanted to support it. I don't understand why I would want to close a discussion. If someone has something to say about it (or like me, wants to support a suggestion), he should be able to do so without opening a new discussion. Sure, you may want to close a discussion because it is getting out of hand, but I would like to leave the rest open.
So I consider this a highly needed feature, just wanted to say. :)
Support Staff 3 Posted by Courtenay on Jul 13, 2010 @ 10:45 PM
The person who opened a discussion can still reply to it, thus
reopening it. But another customer has to open a new discussion.
You see, we get people asking for things like SLAs, because discussion
resolution times are important to them. It really depends on the
nature of the site itself; do you care more about discussion or
closing every item within 2 hours?
4 Posted by holder10 on Jul 13, 2010 @ 10:52 PM
Right, that's why I would like a way to mark a discussion as resolved without closing it for further comments. So, you have the option to mark one as "resolved" and have the separate option to close the discussion.
5 Posted by holder10 on Jul 16, 2010 @ 02:24 PM
Does anyone have more though on that?
6 Posted by Justin on Jul 19, 2010 @ 08:18 PM
I see this as something that can be achieved already without adding an additional layer of complexity. This change sounds simple, but adds an entirely new state to every discussion and changes a core part of Tender.
If you feel you're still in an active discussion with a customer, then I would suggest not closing the discussion (much like what we're doing here) and moving it to a queue you can manage.
Is there a chance you could close the discussion and the customer wasn't done discussing an issue? Sure, but the overhead of opening a new discussion vs. posting another comment is minimal. Comparing that to the overhead it would create for us and our other customers who had to deal with an additional state in Tender, I feel it's better to opt for the queue solution.
Now, because I expect to get a response from you, I'll keep this discussion open. :)
7 Posted by holder10 on Jul 20, 2010 @ 11:44 AM
Hi,
first, I'm not using tender yet and perhaps I'm missing something because I don't know all the details of the backend.
You are right, it would change a core part of Tender. I don't see a big problem here though, you could probably make it completely optional and unobtrusive for those who want to stay with the current system.
The basic point I'm making is that - if I understood that correctly - you have to resolve (=close) a discussion to get it out of your inbox and get the statistics right. Plus, it would look a bit weird if every discussion had the status "open", even if it is basically resolved.
Why I don't want to close (=resolve) discussions is still the same: If someone has a problem, I tell him how to fix it and resolve the discussion. Then, another person has the same problem, discovers the discussion and has more questions. He would have to start another topic for the same question which adds clutter and can quickly become confusing as you have to jump back and forth for information.
Another case (more importantly for me) would be for suggestions. Basically, a suggestion is only resolved when it got realized. But having all these suggestion-discussions at "open" is - if I understood it correctly - not how we should use tender, it doesn't work well (see top). So we would have to resolve them with a "Thanks for the suggestion, we will consider this in the future" (that's at least what many do). But the problem is, suggestions are often based on the number of people who want the suggested feature. So if I want to suggest something, I search for it in the forums. I find it, but the discussion is resolved. I can't add my thoughts on that, I can't say if and how I would make use of the suggested feature and I can't ask when it's done. Sure, I can open another discussion for that. But will I do this? No, I would have to explain the whole suggestion again and I would consider it spammy because such a discussion already exists (see above, it adds clutter).
I wouldn't add it as another state though. Leave the states like they are now (open/resolved) but add "closing" as an option you can do additionally to these states . So a discussion could be "Resolved" or "Resolved [Closed]" or even "Open [Closed]". That's how I would need anyway. :)
So, that's my problem, it's a big bummer for me when considering tender. :/
Could you explain your queue-solution in detail, please?
Thanks,
Lennart
8 Posted by Justin on Jul 20, 2010 @ 06:56 PM
Configuration is the first sign that what you're building isn't for everyone. We have quiet a few request of people just wanting this one little thing. Individually they are small things here and there, but combined they add a lot of complexity and segment the app into those with it on and those with it off. Total that up per user and per feature and you can see how every new option we add to Tender has to be well justified and benefit the majority of our users.
What I'd like to do is solve your problem, but using the tools that are already at our disposal.
We have a featured called "Acknowledge Update" that allows you to keep your Average Response Time in order and take what we consider to be discussion heavy topics (not really a closable) and move them from your inbox without closing the issue. It's simply a link that you click.
Regarding the Queue solution, if you want to keep track of discussions that you're sort of unsure whether or not to close you can drag it into a Queue. A Queue simply groups related discussions. You can access the queue from your sidebar in the admin. Here is a bit more info - http://tenderapp.com/tour/organize/.
I encourage you to try it out. You might find a different workflow that works for you.
Thanks for your feedback and the great discussion!
9 Posted by holder10 on Jul 22, 2010 @ 09:29 AM
Hello,
I'll definitely try your ideas out soon.
While I totally understand that you don't want to add too many options and settings (after all, that's one of the reasons why I am planning to use Tender), I obviously still consider this a very important feature - at least for me and I can see lots of others needing something like this as well, but maybe I'm wrong.
If you don't want to overcomplicate the states by adding a "Close discussion" button to every discussion. maybe another approach would work: Having an option (yeah, I know…) in the backend to allow every user (not just the discussion starter) to un-resolve a discussion. I think that this would actually be a really elegant solution to the problem. The interface would stay clean without much more states and options and it should be understandable for everyone. I even think that many people would want to use that option. Any chance to get it into Tender, at least to get you think about it? ;)
Anyway, thanks a lot for your suggestions so far. I can't try them out and play around with them yet because I fear the 30-day trial would run out before I can test it with the "live" system but I will do so soon, thanks. :)
Cheers,
Lennart
10 Posted by holder10 on Jul 27, 2010 @ 12:05 PM
Any thoughts on the suggested feature? I think it would solve the problem really elegantly. :)
11 Posted by Will on Jul 29, 2010 @ 10:45 PM
Right now we're focused on some other core elements of Tender for some updates we're working on. I've made notes of your suggestions for review when we reevaluate the discussions workflow later on, but functionality won't be changing anytime in the near future.
12 Posted by holder10 on Jul 30, 2010 @ 03:03 PM
Okay, thanks Will. :)
Nicole closed this discussion on Sep 17, 2010 @ 05:47 PM.