Some thoughts on the web centric leadership resources
Posted: Thu Jul 11, 2019 11:45 pm
I had a Relief Society President text me today because she couldn't find the leadership resources section on the church website and needed to submit a food order before she left town tomorrow. Luckily, I remembered that last week when I logged into the site on my laptop, the church site appeared a little different than it had before, and I was able to help her figure out where the menu item had moved to. But, this led to a couple of observations: one new, and a couple that I've been ruminating about for some time.
First the new. Today, while trying to help her out, I logged into the website using 2 different browsers on 2 different platforms (firefox and chrome on Windows and Mac). I got 3 different versions of the site. In chrome on the mac, I got the same site organization that had been used prior to last week, in chrome on my laptop, I got the new site organization (a grid icon with tiles for the different options, with a very limited menu under found by clicking on a user silhouette). Using incognito mode in chrome on my mac I got a hybrid of the 2, and in firefox on my windows box, I got the original site. This was quite confusing to me, and I can only imagine how frustrating it would be to someone who doesn't work with web technologies on a daily basis. I really think that some effort needs to be made to let members know before large changes like navigation are applied to the church website. We have to remember that not all the leaders who have to interact with the site are as comfortable with tech as we are.
Second: with the move to doing more and more through the website, I have been frustrated with the fact that I no longer can see exactly what the users are seeing when they contact me for support. When I was first called as a STS, everything was done through MLS. This was frustrating to leaders because they had to come to the church building to get parts of their callings done. But, it made it much easier to support members. I had the latest MLS installed on my computer with the test unit, so the member could call me on the phone, walk me through the steps they took, and I could get a good idea of what was going on. Like a lot of STS's, I also set up an administrative user in MLS so that I could go to the building during the regular hours church support was open and I could walk through the steps the member took with a support rep, thus saving them from having to take additional time off work so that they could be present for what could be an extended debugging session. Now when I get a call, I have no idea what their interface looks like, so I can only offer vague suggestions, or I have to set up a time to be able to look over their shoulder. In some applications I've developed, we have made the functionality (logged and documented) for an admin user to be able to impersonate another user for the purposes of being able to debug issues that the user saw, but just providing screenshots of the interface for different groups of users would be helpful. That way if an Elders Quorum President calls, I can at least have an idea of what the interface looks like for them.
Third: I think that some tweaks to the permissions are in order, and I don't know who to talk to about it. For instance: As an STS, I can't view the broadcast schedules. I had to ask the stake clerk to add me as an "assistant stake clerk", as well as "assistant stake clerk: Stake Technology Specialist" so that I could view the information on our last stake conference broadcast. This has had the unfortunate side effect of me getting email notifications for stake clerk things like financial transactions.
First the new. Today, while trying to help her out, I logged into the website using 2 different browsers on 2 different platforms (firefox and chrome on Windows and Mac). I got 3 different versions of the site. In chrome on the mac, I got the same site organization that had been used prior to last week, in chrome on my laptop, I got the new site organization (a grid icon with tiles for the different options, with a very limited menu under found by clicking on a user silhouette). Using incognito mode in chrome on my mac I got a hybrid of the 2, and in firefox on my windows box, I got the original site. This was quite confusing to me, and I can only imagine how frustrating it would be to someone who doesn't work with web technologies on a daily basis. I really think that some effort needs to be made to let members know before large changes like navigation are applied to the church website. We have to remember that not all the leaders who have to interact with the site are as comfortable with tech as we are.
Second: with the move to doing more and more through the website, I have been frustrated with the fact that I no longer can see exactly what the users are seeing when they contact me for support. When I was first called as a STS, everything was done through MLS. This was frustrating to leaders because they had to come to the church building to get parts of their callings done. But, it made it much easier to support members. I had the latest MLS installed on my computer with the test unit, so the member could call me on the phone, walk me through the steps they took, and I could get a good idea of what was going on. Like a lot of STS's, I also set up an administrative user in MLS so that I could go to the building during the regular hours church support was open and I could walk through the steps the member took with a support rep, thus saving them from having to take additional time off work so that they could be present for what could be an extended debugging session. Now when I get a call, I have no idea what their interface looks like, so I can only offer vague suggestions, or I have to set up a time to be able to look over their shoulder. In some applications I've developed, we have made the functionality (logged and documented) for an admin user to be able to impersonate another user for the purposes of being able to debug issues that the user saw, but just providing screenshots of the interface for different groups of users would be helpful. That way if an Elders Quorum President calls, I can at least have an idea of what the interface looks like for them.
Third: I think that some tweaks to the permissions are in order, and I don't know who to talk to about it. For instance: As an STS, I can't view the broadcast schedules. I had to ask the stake clerk to add me as an "assistant stake clerk", as well as "assistant stake clerk: Stake Technology Specialist" so that I could view the information on our last stake conference broadcast. This has had the unfortunate side effect of me getting email notifications for stake clerk things like financial transactions.