Workspaces and Collaboration

Workspaces and Collaboration

Workspaces are the shared place for recurring team analysis in DashboardGenius.

If you still hear the older label Team Spaces, treat that as the previous name for the same collaboration concept. The current product direction is Workspaces.

What Workspaces Are

A workspace is a durable shared area for a stable audience such as:

• a plant
• a function
• an operating lane
• a recurring team workflow

Workspaces are for active work, not just storage.

Use them when you want teammates to reopen, continue, and build on the same analysis over time.

Workspaces vs Private

DashboardGenius supports two practical ways to start most work:

• Private for rough thinking, sensitive questions, or early exploration
• Workspace for shared operational work that should stay reusable

Use Private when:

• the question is still messy
• the audience is unclear
• the topic may be politically or operationally sensitive

Use a Workspace when:

• the work belongs to a clear team or plant
• someone else may need to continue it later
• the same context will matter again

Quick Rule of Thumb

Ask one simple question before you start:

"If I disappear after this answer, should someone else be able to pick this up easily?"

If yes, start in a Workspace. If not, start private and move it later only if the work becomes reusable.

Why Workspaces Matter

Without shared scope, useful analysis stays trapped in personal chat history.

Workspaces help your team:

• keep recurring analysis in the right shared place
• continue the same thread instead of recreating it
• reuse plant or function context over time
• make good outputs easier to find later

Workspaces also give teams a better browsing surface for recent threads, shared insights, and active collaboration than relying on personal history alone.

They also work well with Gallery because shared workspace activity is the cleanest path for keeping strong team visuals visible later.

How to Start Work in a Workspace

A common workflow looks like this:

1. Start a new chat
2. Switch scope from Private to the right Workspace
3. Ask the question in that shared scope from the beginning
4. Let teammates continue the same thread later if needed

If the right workspace does not exist yet, create one with a plain, durable name.

If useful work started in private first, move it into the right Workspace once the audience becomes clear.

What Belongs in a Workspace

Good Workspace content:

• recurring operating reviews
• shared line, plant, or function investigations
• threads that feed leadership updates
• analyses likely to become reports or reusable references

Poor Workspace content:

• rough draft thinking that may never matter again
• highly sensitive topics that should stay limited
• throwaway questions with no reuse value

Continue Existing Shared Threads

Workspaces are designed for thread continuity, not only one-time sharing.

That means:

• one user can start a shared thread
• another user can reopen it later
• another user can continue the same analysis with AI in the same thread

This is one of the main reasons to use Workspaces instead of keeping everything private.

Use the Workspace Home Intentionally

The Workspaces area is most useful when you treat it as an active operating surface, not just a list of containers.

Teams often use it to:

• reopen the most active shared spaces
• jump into recent shared threads
• review insight-rich threads that should stay visible
• spot spaces that need cleanup or ownership

Recommended Workspace Structure

Start broad, not perfect.

For most organizations, 3 to 5 workspaces is enough to begin:

• Central Operations
• Quality
• Logistics or Supply
• Leadership Reporting
• plant-specific workspaces where needed

Do not create a workspace for every metric, SKU, or short-lived issue.

Use thread titles, saved outputs, and recurring reports for finer organization.

Use Workspaces with AI Context

Use Workspaces for active team work.

Use AI Context for durable shared definitions.

Simple operating model:

• Workspaces: shared threads, ongoing questions, recurring collaboration
• AI Context: definitions, naming standards, KPI rules, policy references

This separation keeps collaboration useful without turning Workspaces into a glossary.

Use Workspaces with Sharing and Reports

Once a thread is producing useful output, Workspaces become the hub for downstream actions:

• share the result by email for immediate delivery
• convert strong recurring threads into Scheduled Reports
• keep follow-up discussion in the same shared thread

That is usually more durable than resending one-off screenshots from private chat.

If a visualization should remain visible to the team, keep the thread in a Workspace so it can contribute to shared insight history instead of only personal history.

Ownership and Governance

Keep governance lightweight:

• assign a clear owner for each important workspace
• review stale workspaces periodically
• rename or archive weak workspace structures instead of letting them sprawl
• keep naming patterns consistent across plants and functions

Most teams should evolve their workspace structure through use rather than trying to design a perfect taxonomy on day one.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

• creating too many workspaces too early
• using a workspace when the question should stay private
• sharing outputs late instead of starting the thread in the correct scope
• treating workspaces like folders instead of active work areas

Next Guide

Continue with AI Context Playbook.

If your team needs a stronger visual-history workflow, see Gallery and Shared Insights.