Control Groups

I'll throw in a little end-user perspective about what I like about control groups: they make it easier for everyone to do their job well.  And I hope they will be expanded to allow even more of that.

(Though I second the comment about "control groups" and "user groups" being confused with each other; I'm hoping I got them right in my post below!)

Some stories about what I like about the current functionality:

Beth the Membership Manager is approached by David the Education Manager, asking if her staff can help with some class sales catchup.  Normally, Beth's staff works in the contributions module in a closed batch; selling classes requires work in the ticketing module, on an open batch, doing sales that a separate department needs to check, close, and post.  Beth needs to make sure that her staff won't get muddled up in such extreme roll changes, and potentially make errors without realizing it; she also wants them to track their time spent on Education entry, not hop willy-nilly between class sales and membership data entry all day long.  Separate control groups tied to user groups solves this problem; if they are logged in under the Education user group, they can't access the contributions module, and if logged in under Membership, they can't sell to the ticket module.  They can't forget which role they are in, can't accidentally mess up a ticket order because they forgot not to go that section if they are doing Membership data entry, and can't easily hop between the two separate task types.


Beth needs to check functionality before and after each Tessitura upgrade.  She has her staff check their data entry functionality, and the box office and call center test theirs ... but having seen the consequences if testers miss something, she really needs to check that basic membership functions work for herself.  She is able to log in under the Membership Sales user group and see exactly what her staff will see; she can do the same for the Box Office user group and the Call Center user group.  Then she can move back into her Membership Manager user group and check that the back end looks correct for all these sales.  This allows her to confirm that all basic sales are working and none of the staff will have ugly surprises when they log in after the upgrade.


Call Center representatives work anywhere from just 4 hours a week to 40 hours a week.  They sell memberships on a regular basis, but don't have the training or the time to do detailed analysis on a patron's membership status.  However, some of them would like to be able to see a member's membership history.  Beth and the Call Center Manager agree to give view-only rights to the "history" tab for call center reps.   Reps who have a more sophisticated understanding of Tessitura can view the membership history and even learn to interpret that screen if they wish; those who have less sophistication and/or time can just do basic service and pass more complicated questions on.  But none of the reps will be able to edit a members history, thinking that they are helping, when they don't understand enough about the functionality to realize they could be causing a major problem.



And one that can't be done now, but I would love:

Beth is training Sean the Membership Assistant to help make corrections on contributions sold through the ticketing module (eg sales from the box office, call center, or web).  Because they were sold in ticketing, they must be corrected in ticketing as well; they can't be adjusted from the contributions area, where Sean usually works.  Beth can ask that Sean be given view-only access to the ticket order tabs within a patron's order, but that he have full edit access on the contributions tab of that order.  Now Sean can help Beth make corrections, but the ticketing staff know that Sean can't accidentally goof something up in the ticket order area.

I'll throw in a little end-user perspective about what I like about control groups: they make it easier for everyone to do their job well.  And I hope they will be expanded to allow even more of that.

(Though I second the comment about "control groups" and "user groups" being confused with each other; I'm hoping I got them right in my post below!)

Some stories about what I like about the current functionality:

Beth the Membership Manager is approached by David the Education Manager, asking if her staff can help with some class sales catchup.  Normally, Beth's staff works in the contributions module in a closed batch; selling classes requires work in the ticketing module, on an open batch, doing sales that a separate department needs to check, close, and post.  Beth needs to make sure that her staff won't get muddled up in such extreme roll changes, and potentially make errors without realizing it; she also wants them to track their time spent on Education entry, not hop willy-nilly between class sales and membership data entry all day long.  Separate control groups tied to user groups solves this problem; if they are logged in under the Education user group, they can't access the contributions module, and if logged in under Membership, they can't sell to the ticket module.  They can't forget which role they are in, can't accidentally mess up a ticket order because they forgot not to go that section if they are doing Membership data entry, and can't easily hop between the two separate task types.


Beth needs to check functionality before and after each Tessitura upgrade.  She has her staff check their data entry functionality, and the box office and call center test theirs ... but having seen the consequences if testers miss something, she really needs to check that basic membership functions work for herself.  She is able to log in under the Membership Sales user group and see exactly what her staff will see; she can do the same for the Box Office user group and the Call Center user group.  Then she can move back into her Membership Manager user group and check that the back end looks correct for all these sales.  This allows her to confirm that all basic sales are working and none of the staff will have ugly surprises when they log in after the upgrade.


Call Center representatives work anywhere from just 4 hours a week to 40 hours a week.  They sell memberships on a regular basis, but don't have the training or the time to do detailed analysis on a patron's membership status.  However, some of them would like to be able to see a member's membership history.  Beth and the Call Center Manager agree to give view-only rights to the "history" tab for call center reps.   Reps who have a more sophisticated understanding of Tessitura can view the membership history and even learn to interpret that screen if they wish; those who have less sophistication and/or time can just do basic service and pass more complicated questions on.  But none of the reps will be able to edit a members history, thinking that they are helping, when they don't understand enough about the functionality to realize they could be causing a major problem.



And one that can't be done now, but I would love:

Beth is training Sean the Membership Assistant to help make corrections on contributions sold through the ticketing module (eg sales from the box office, call center, or web).  Because they were sold in ticketing, they must be corrected in ticketing as well; they can't be adjusted from the contributions area, where Sean usually works.  Beth can ask that Sean be given view-only access to the ticket order tabs within a patron's order, but that he have full edit access on the contributions tab of that order.  Now Sean can help Beth make corrections, but the ticketing staff know that Sean can't accidentally goof something up in the ticket order area.