I could not agree more, this is a standard piece of information presented by many companies in the current market/world. I believe this would help us all greatly. The below is a quick summary of my thoughts from this post related to other issues (Den Leader Exp.)
I received the same response “Contact your council”.
Today
- No official announcements of DLE going away
- No Roadmap to help us understand the future vision and ecosystem
- Seems to be getting more de-centralized
- Dissatisfied user base
However
- It seems that there is assumption that it is going away.
- The feature is prominently displayed and promoted on the landing page for Scoutbook.
- Councils promote the use of Scoutbook and DLE.
Reality
- Uncertainty creates a poor user adoption
- Reduces confidence in the use of the tools by instilling doubt in the user group of stability.
- Creates reluctance for leaders to drive our packs / troops to use these tools
- Eventually drives us away from the ecosystem provided by the BSA to paid tools where we have stability, better functionality, and visibility to the future.
- BSA is driving competition to ‘official software’
** Comparison of Boy Scout Troop Management Software - ScoutWiki
** Not limited to troop/pack management but also messaging: Spond, GroupMe, Band
How to fix this
- Create a road map
a. Why hide the future
b. Most companies are moving to public facing roadmaps as it is proven to help system adoption
c. It is understood that Roadmaps will change
d. Creates vision and reduces unknown anxiety for the user base
e. Addresses many forum topics
f. Clear path of when systems will be retired - Centralize Systems
a. Focus on User Experience
b. KISS principle - Keep it Simple… for all users - User Input
a. I think the forum is good
b. Is there a panel of actual users of the systems? If so how do you become involved?
c. Add in the feature request section a Voting option where users can vote for specific features to help identify the priority.
