Every question that has been asked is routed to the Answer Coordinator(s) (ACs). This is the only mandatory role in Q&A - the others are optional.
There are a few ways of using the Q&A screen - as a tool to answer questions, to assign questions to experts, and as a reporting tool to review what questions have been asked and answered.
Answer Coordinator Quick Filters
Click the New Questions filter on the left to see the questions requiring your immediate attention. Use the column headings to filter the questions by priority, date, or the question group that asked the question.
The In Progress filter shows you questions that are currently being attended to, but for which answers have not yet been drafted
The To Approve/Submit filter shows answers that have been drafted by Experts or ACs, and are waiting for your review to be submitted.
If the Approver role is present, the To Approve filter will contain answers that need to be reviewed by the Approver.
To see all of the questions and answers regardless of their state, in All Statuses, click Reset Filters.
Answer a question
To answer a question, or assign a question to an Expert, click the Question's title.
This is the Answer screen. Let’s break it down to understand it:
At the top, you can see the author’s question. The right pane contains further information about the question - who asked the question, when the question was submitted, its priority, etc. If your project allows anonymous questions, the author’s name will be hidden.
You may re-prioritize and re-categorize a question based on your own workflow.
Activity surrounding the question appears at the bottom, in the Activity Feed. You will find the back-and-forth communication between the Answer Coordinator, Experts, and Approvers. This activity is internal and will not be shared with the Question Side.
If you know the answer to the question, you may type it in the answer pane. You may link to existing documents or folders from the Documents tab or choose to upload new documents, and then Submit the answer to the question group. Click the checkbox below the answer to submit the answers to all the question groups (that is, make the answer public).
Assign a question
You may assign the question to either another AC or an Expert. To do so, click the Assign button. Select or type the Expert’s or AC’s name. The person to whom you assign the question may receive an email notification (depending on the group’s notification settings), and the question will appear in their Q&A screen.
You may copy other individuals by including them in the CC fields, though no action is required on their part. Lastly, you may write a custom message, which will only be seen by the Answer Side.
When there is an Approver in place
When the AC is ready to submit the question, the last step will be sending the answer for approval to the Approver via the Send for Approval button.
The Approver has the option to either approve the proposed answer or reject it. If the answer is rejected, they can include comments. The Approver will be able to make the questions public to all Question Groups or send the answer to the Question Group who asked the question.
Note that if the option “Require Answer Coordinator to manually submit answer to Question group after approval” is checked in Q&A Settings > Options, the AC will need to manually submit the answer after it has been approved by the Approver.
The approved answer can be found in the "To Submit" section, waiting for the Answer Coordinator to submit the approved answer to the question side.
Exporting Q&A results
The Q&A results that you see in the Q&A tab can be exported to an Excel spreadsheet.
Export All Results will export all questions and answers available to you in the Q&A.
Export Filtered Results will only export the questions and answers within the filters requested via the left pane.