Workspace tags

Workspace tags help connect themes across projects and teams. They are global / universal tags that can be linked and applied to data across multiple projects at once. See them in action here.

They are a mechanism for researchers who want to create and standardize sets of tags for teams in the workspace. Workspace tag boards are commonly used for creating personas, shared feature requests, jobs-to-be-done, platform flows, and more.

By default, tags in Dovetail live in a specific project and can’t be shared across projects. Workspace tag boards enable you to pull in and apply common 'global' tags that can be linked to and re-used across different projects.

When you create a workspace tag board, you’ll need to link the tag board to one or more projects so each project can use the tags.

Inside a project, nothing changes – tags are seamlessly integrated with existing tags inside a project. You can create highlights like normal, choosing workspace tags or project tags without too much thought.

Workspace tag boards are ‘live’ – changes you make to tags in a workspace tag board will immediately be reflected in all linked projects. In this sense, workspace tag boards in Dovetail are similar to Masters in Keynote, Symbols, and Libraries in Sketch, and Components in Figma.

Managers can create workspace tag boards and contributors can add individual tags to a workspace tag board.

• To create a workspace tag board, navigate to ⚙️ Settings → Tags → Create new workspace tag board.

• From there, you can populate this board with individual tags by selecting + New tag or importing a spreadsheet of existing global tags.

You can limit who has full, edit, and view access to shared workspace tag boards in the workspace.

• To do this, open the workspace tag board, select Share, and assign View only access to the workspace. You will be the only user with Full access to the board.

• From there, you choose to invite other team members or groups to share Full access, Edit access, or View access to the board.

Any manager or contributor with View only access to the board can link the tag board to a project, but cannot add or remove tags from this board.

Once you’ve created your workspace tag board, you’ll want to link it to relevant projects. To link a workspace tag board to a project:

• Navigate to your project, click + next to Tags in the side menu, and select Use and existing board

• From there, select your workspace tag board and select Link to project.

When setting up workspace tags, you can use these as prompts to find magic highlights in your data. automatically classify and group highlights using your existing project tags. Create new tags based on the themes you care about tracking, and they’ll start being used on suggested highlights.

Over time, as the tag is applied to more highlights, it will become more accurate in recognizing when to apply it.

You can also create a workspace tag board by linking and converting another project's local tag board.

For example, in Project A you can view Project B's tag board created. If Project B's board is linked to Project A, Project B's tag board will be converted to a workspace tag board as it is used in 2 projects. To link and convert a project's local tag board to a workspace tag board:

• Click on the ••• next to the tag board name

• Click Convert to workspace tag board

You can move tags from a project to a workspace tag board, or from one workspace tag board to another. To move a tag:

• To do this, hover your mouse over the tag you'd like to move, click on the (•••) button, and select Move to….

• From there, choose a tag board, and specific tag group to move the tag to.

You can undo this action immediately after by clicking the Undo button on the confirmation message in the bottom right corner.

Once in the same board, you can also merge similar tags with on another. By doing this, all highlights under a tagged will share the same workspace tag.

• Hover your mouse over the tag you'd like to move, click on the (•••) button, and select Merge into….

• From there, choose the tag you want to merge your current tag into.

Templates help you standardize user research across your organization by giving other people a starting set of data, tags, and project configuration to begin new projects from.

Workspace tag boards can be linked directly to project templates. By linking a board, any new project created from your template will automatically include your workspace tag boards and connect related data across projects.

Learn how to link a workspace tag board to a project template →

If you no longer wish to use a specific workspace tag board in a specific project, you can unlink the board from your project.

• To unlink a project, open your workspace tag board in ⚙️ Settings → Tags.

• From there, open Linked projects and toggle off the project.

If you no longer need a workspace tag board, you can delete a workspace tag board. This goes to trash where it can be restored for 30 days. Only managers and contributors who have Full access to a tag board.

• To do this, open your workspace tag board in ⚙️ Settings → Tags.

• From there, click on the title of your board and select Move tag board to trash.

Please note: When you unlink from a project or delete a whole workspace tag board, any projects that were using it will be unlinked. From there, the tags will duplicate into each project as local, project tags. This may result in duplicated tags across your workspace.