This post has been republished via RSS; it originally appeared at: Microsoft Kaizala Blog articles.
Communication in a business context involves constant flow of information, exchange of ideas and unstructured data, feedback loops and more. For a complex and large organization spanning across knowledge workers, Firstline workers and the extended ecosystem of vendors, supplier, partners, customers, and even citizens, this can get complicated very quickly. It becomes increasingly important to plan how everyone is going to communicate. Microsoft Kaizala allows organizations to model their needs based on the flexible group types, large group size, and flexible policies.
Kaizala supports flexible group type:
Besides simple 1:1 chat, Kaizala supports three kinds of groups: flat, hierarchical, hub and spoke. Hierarchical, and hub and spoke groups can only be created using the Kaizala management portal.
Flat groups:
Flat groups are simple chat groups where every group member can interact with each other without any restrictions. Flat groups can be created either using the mobile app, or on the portal.
Key characteristics of a flat group:
- Standard messaging groups where you can add thousands of users
- Ability to add users using phone numbers, saving a contact first is not required
- Create and assign Kaizala Actions like (Job, Survey, Poll, etc.) to any participant of the group.
- Phone numbers of group members are only visible to the group admin, unless the member is already in an individual contact list
Hierarchical groups:
Most organizations in real world are not flat, and have some sort of hierarchical structure. Unlike a flat group, where information shared is visible to everyone in the group, information flows from the top to the bottom in hierarchical i.e. nested groups. Note that hierarchies can only be created via the Kaizala management portal.
Key characteristics of a hierarchical group:
- Groups can have direct members as well as subgroups as members (nested groups)
- Message sent at any level goes to all members of that group and down to all its child groups. Hence, chat is disabled in parent groups but all Kaizala Actions are enabled. So members of parent groups can send Announcements or Surveys which will be sent to the entire organization.
- Any group member can create and assign Kaizala Actions like (Job, Survey, Poll, etc.) to anyone in the same group or any child group.
- Child groups cannot send a message to a parent group or peer groups but they can express their views through Likes and Comments on each Kaizala Action sent to them.
- Bottom groups (leaf nodes) of the hierarchical groups are regular flat groups.
Hub and Spoke group:
A hub and spoke group in Kaizala is a unique group where members of the group can interact with the admin of the group on a one-to-one basis, but the interactions cannot be seen by other group members. Note that Hub and Spoke groups can only be created on the Kaizala management portal.
Key characteristics of a hub and spoke group:
- Admin can connect with any number of members and send and seek information.
- Members cannot see each other or interact with each other.
- Members can communicate with admins only through admin-defined custom cards like giving Feedback, Share your requirement, etc.
- Members can subscribe to a public group using a link
- A hub and spoke group can either be managed (group admins can view, manage and invite subscribers) or public (Subscribers can also invite other subscribers. Group admins cannot view or manage subscribers).
Choosing the right group type:
Hub and spoke groups are ideal for:
- Government organizations engaging with citizens
- Businesses engaging with their customers for product announcements, news updates, order bookings etc.
- Real time updates, customer service, order intake and more
- A general need to connect with large group of people
Hierarchical groups are ideal for:
- Organizations mapping groups to individual counties, states, departments, field sites, sales units, subsidiaries etc.
- Coordinating work in a complex environment, gathering field data etc.
- Employee engagement, communication and trainings
Flat groups are ideal for small teams, project groups, coordinating work across suppliers, vendors etc. - scenarios where everyone in the group is interacting with each other.
Private versus a managed group:
A flat Kaizala group can either be private or managed with an Office365 tenant.
Private groups: When you create a group using the Kaizala mobile app, the group is private by default, i.e. it is not mapped to an organization.
Managed groups: If you have linked your Kaizala account to an Office365 tenant, you can add the group to your organization, which makes it a managed group. Any group created using the Kaizala management portal is a managed group, mapped to that particular tenant. A work group should always be mapped to a tenant, so you can leverage the advanced administration and management capabilities available with Office365: such as customizable group policies, Kaizala Actions, group membership, data ownership and more.
Learn more about other unique capabilities with groups in Kaizala: such as bulk upload, customizable group background, welcome message, group policies and more.