This approach offers several key benefits:
- Ensures clarity and consistency – By limiting emoji choices to a pre-defined set, teams avoid misinterpretation and maintain a shared understanding of what each emoji represents.
- Supports focused feedback – Suggested emojis are selected to align with common QI themes such as approval, concern, progress, and ideas—making reactions more meaningful and relevant.
- Reduces noise and distraction – Restricting emojis helps keep the visual environment clean and professional, especially in formal or regulated settings.
- Encourages intentional use – With a curated set, users are more likely to use emojis thoughtfully, reinforcing their value as a communication tool rather than a novelty.
This feature helps teams stay aligned while still benefiting from the expressiveness and engagement that emojis bring to collaborative improvement work.
How to configure suggested reactions
Reactions need to be enabled on the card via the Behaviour configuration pane before being able to enable suggested reactions.
- Select the card you want to configure suggested reactions for.
- Select Configure from the top right hand corner.
- Select Behaviour from the pop-out.
- Select the cog icon next to the Reactions toggle.
- Select the toggle next to Suggested reactions to enable it.
- Allow all reactions (optional) - Along side configuring a selection suggested reactions that team members can choose from, you can also provide the option to use an emoji from the rest of the reaction library by enabling this. If you do not want team members to be able to choose other reactions then leave this turned off.
- Select + Add Suggested Reaction.
- Select an emoji from the library from the placeholder on the left.
- Give the emoji a suitable label. i.e. 👍 – Agree / support
- Show as badge on card - Select this for the emoji to be visible when the card has not been selected.
- You can use the dragger on the left hand side of the suggested reaction to re-order the list they appear in.
Examples of suggested reactions
📊 Run Charts / Control Charts
Used to track performance over time and identify trends or variation.
Suggested Emoji Set:
- 📈 – Positive trend
- 📉 – Negative trend
- ⚠️ – Special cause variation / anomaly
- ✅ – Stable / in control
- 🔍 – Needs investigation
- 🟢 – On target
- 🔴 – Off target
📋 Action Plans / Task Lists
Used to track actions, responsibilities, and deadlines.
Suggested Emoji Set:
- ✅ – Completed
- ⏳ – In progress
- 📅 – Scheduled
- 🚫 – Blocked
- 🔄 – Needs review
- 🆕 – New task
- 👥 – Team task
🗣️ Feedback & Collaboration Boards
Used for team input, reflections, or retrospectives.
Suggested Emoji Set:
- 👍 – Agree / support
- 👎 – Disagree / concern
- 🤔 – Needs more thought
- 👏 – Great work
- 🗨️ – Comment / discussion
- 🧭 – Needs direction
- 🧠 – Insightful
🔄 PDSA Cycles (Plan-Do-Study-Act)
Used to test and refine changes in a structured way.
Suggested Emoji Set:
- 📝 – Planning phase
- ▶️ – Doing / testing
- 🔍 – Studying results
- 🔁 – Iterating / acting
- ✅ – Successful test
- ❌ – Test failed
- 🧪 – Experiment in progress
🧭 Driver Diagrams
Used to map out the theory of change, showing primary and secondary drivers and change ideas.
Suggested Emoji Set:
- 💡 – New idea
- 🔗 – Strong connection / alignment
- ❓ – Needs clarification
- 🧠 – Innovative thinking
- 📌 – Key driver
- 🧩 – Missing piece
- 🚧 – Under development