By
El Copeland
March 2, 2025
•
20 min read
Professional Development
Tutorials
Doodles or Data: A Conference Note Survival Guide
Before you get started
This article is a companion to my article on how to get the most out of Conference and Industry events. While most of the concepts here will not require external explanation, some things will be linked to subsections in my article, “Ripe for the Picking: Maximize your Conference ROI” and you may benefit from skimming that piece for context or discussion.
This article is about the importance of good notetaking including a demonstration of one of the methods I personally use. I have a lightweight template in OneNote that I’ve scrubbed for your use and you can download that here. We will also use a fair amount of genAI through ChatGPT.
As with most things from Rising Tide, this document is not dictatorial. We feel everything evolves and the goal for this was to be an easy tool that can be implemented with little effort. If you have feedback or questions or just want to argue, feel free to find me on LinkedIn or the MSPGeek Discord community (@cinakur) and I’ll be glad to chat!
Why take notes? This isn’t school.
I was a poor student in school, ironically driven but unmotivated. I knew I wanted to make a difference in the world, and that was it. I didn’t even plan on getting an Engineering degree. My family was lower-middle class in a rural town in the southeast United States that sprung up around an Air Force Base 80 years ago. I was the first on both sides of the family to go straight from high school to college, so I had no context or support about what it would take to be a Doctor, Lawyer, or even Engineer. I thought maybe I’d just get some vague Liberal Arts degree and become a teacher or get married and be a mom. Nothing bad about being a teacher or a mother, I still could see myself being both one day: it’s just that I had no dreams of my own, no direction or understanding. I thank all that is good in this world that college counselor looked at my SAT scores and was surprised I wasn't already pursuing something explicitly science and math focused!
While I say I was a poor student, I did receive good grades in basic classes and hands-on labs as I am a generally curious person, so talking about theory, tangible experience, and writing about it carried me a long way. However, as classes advanced from practical to theoretical, I rarely operated well under pressure and had poor time management so I would often fail homework and mid-term exams. When my Master’s Thesis was due, an advisor of mine chided me, noting I should be much further along in my research and analysis and questioning if I’d even make the deadline to defend it that year. (His talking-to was the motivation I needed to complete, even if I was doing it out of spite.)
School was miserable, sitting at a desk for hours a day was miserable: there were a million other things I could be doing and were already thinking about as I am half listening to a tenured professor drone on about whatever heady topic the syllabus offered.
Did my notes in those classes carry me through? I think back to them and I can clearly see in my mind’s eye: a doodle I made of my water chemistry professor as a lobster from 17 years ago. So, I guess you can say, yes, they carried me, but probably not for the right reason.
So why am I, an admittedly poor student, writing a blog post about note-taking? How did I even get out of college with two degrees? And why a lobster!?
Well, here’s the thing: with each exam I took, and with each hands-on lab, I finally understood the concept. Something about the adrenaline and skills that I needed to perform helped the concepts solidify in my mind, and eventually I even had enough confidence to tutor others in those courses!
The key was, and is, action.
It’s easy to freeze after a conference. You’ve taken in so much information: new names, new faces, new products, new settings, new experiences. Hopefully, most are good, but maybe some are bad. How do you KNOW what action to take, how do you even remember?
In this article, we’re going to talk about one way to create meaningful plans of action through note-taking at conferences, using the template that I created as a guide. We’ll look at our notes according to the lifecycle of your conference attendance: choosing the event, attending, and after. For this article, I’m going to use the two examples, one of planning to attend CodeMash, Home - CodeMash., following their 2025 event, and the other with my actual notes from Right of Boom 2025.
Let’s start at the beginning.
El’s Template Overview: A Walkthrough
Before getting into how I use the template, let’s go over what is in it and my thought process behind it.
Did you download it yet? You can get that OneNote file here: Conference Note Template. (Contact me if you want a different type of export!)
The key thing about building with action in mind is that I bookend my trip with intentional processing and preparation so I can enjoy the event with confidence, knowing I am being responsible with my time, skill, and relationships. There are three main parts to the thought process that governed my template:
- Know Your Why. Expending mental energy at the beginning reduces the number of decisions and subsequent decision fatigue you'll experience on-site. Set the vision upfront and it will go a long way.
- Keep it Simple. You want something you can return to throughout the conference, without "debt" or guilt. Giving yourself something easy to come back to as a touch point and "source of truth" will make this more attainable.
- Be Accountable and Finish Strong. Have a dedicated time to synthesize and analyze what you've learned and what your next steps are!
I personally do this by bookending my trip with 1-hour on each side: the hour before I plan my goals, and the hour after I summarize and make an action plan. Considering a conference with travel is easily a 40-60 hour week (and longer for vendors!), 2-hours is a small investment on the success of my conference attendance from a content perspective.
If we’re looking for direction on action at the end of this, we need to know where to find certain things we talked about, and that is all this OneNote template is. So, let's take a look! If you'd like to follow along, I have screenshots that follow as well as a video I recorded, available here: A Conference Note Survival Guide.
I like to have a Conferences Notebook shared between the team, and for each conference I add a Section Group, with the given year as a Section. So I copy parts of my template to the given location as needed.
Within the template, you will find four main sections:
- Conference Overview
- Session Notes
- Networking
- Vendors
Let’s talk about each section and how they’re used.
Conference Overview
The point of this page is to visualize what success looks like for this conference, personally and as a team. You’ll find there are a lot of questions on this first page. You don’t have to answer all of them, but asking them ahead of time will give you some clarity on the type of questions you could be asking to get the most out of this event.
Session Notes
Session Notes are broken up into two parts: Agenda and Session Notes.
Agenda
Make an Agenda page for each team member attending so you can compare sessions, notes, and ask questions!
Session Notes
Session Notes are for the actual Session Notes. Even if you don't take notes or even attend the session, you can fill in things you hear other people mention about it down the road!
Yes, more questions for you to ask. These are helpful when you do some AI analysis at the end.
Networking
Networking should be lightweight! You're going to meet a ton of people, quickly. Keep it at a high level as much as possible.
Vendors
Vendors should generally be separate from your Networking so can have a place for notes about their product that aren't related to them personally.
Before you go: Know your Why.
Now that we have the lay of the land for the template, let's set up our example of attending Codemash 2025 (CodeMash).
We create the new Section for this event and copy in the template pages.
Now, the work starts. For me, I like to give myself one-hour to work this through. It’s enough time to do research and not too much time that I feel like I’m getting in the weeds.
Set the Course: What's your Why?
If you read the article this is a companion to, you know I think setting your intentions for a conference is the foremost important thing to accomplish once you decide you’re going.
So, tell me, why do you want to attend CodeMash?
- My friends are all going and I’d like to see them.
- There is a certain topic on the schedule I want to learn about.
- [Semi-famous Person] will be speaking.
- Networking with new people or people in a specific industry.
- Some other secret reason.
Do you have clear reasons you want to attend? Take a look at the Agenda from a high level or ask around. Maybe it’s worth asking a generative AI to help frame this. Perhaps ask, “Why should I, as an MSP (or individual, or business, depending on the data you’ve fed your AI!), want to attend Codemash?”
It’ll likely give you a bunch of reason, and while these are all probably valid to some degree, limit it to 1-2 main reasons and let the rest be a bonus. Review the website for vendors and key speakers that are meaningful to you. Fill out this section on the Conference Overview page.
Fully Review the Agenda.
Now, it's time to review the conference agenda a little more thoroughly. Which sessions do you want to attend? Here is their 2025 Agenda for context: 2025 CodeMash Conference
Fill those in on the Agenda page. Each team-member attending can have their own Agenda page so you can see what courses everyone else is taking and divide and conquer the session topics, or take joint notes on the same document and fill in each others’ blanks.
And add the Description and key notes to a new page in that section. Read the questions in the Session Notes section and write out your OWN questions of what you'd like to learn in this session based on your understanding of the Summary.
Rinse and Repeat until you have a full schedule. Be sure to put breaks in there occasionally for client calls or for serendipitous hallway meetings!
Some of these sessions, I won’t be taking active notes in (like the soldering course) but may want to have somewhere to dump resources or other notes afterwards! There may be a few different days that I jump into lightning talks, so I group them all together, they don’t need separate pages!
Got it?
The main things to remember here echo the blog post on conferences.
- Determine your why by seriously evaluating the agenda, determining your goals, and talking with your team about their own.
- Pre-prep what you can so you don’t have to make too many live decisions.
- Don’t overcrowd it. Make sure you’re not overcommitting!
One more thing I pre-prep to help keep my focus: I travel with my work laptop but I do not take it to the sessions. Instead, I take a lightweight tablet. This allows me to focus on what I’m here for: networking and learning and not answering emails or surreptitiously working on projects.
Boots on the ground: Capture Insights, be Present.
Time to actually take notes. At this point, we'll transition from planning the CodeMash trip to looking at my actual experience at Right of Boom this past year. Depending on your situation, you may or may not have the time or space to take “good” notes. I generally find myself in one of two situations:
- Session Notes: Sitting in a session with a tablet in front of me, able to take thoughtful notes
- Conversation Notes: Standing in a hallway, at a meal, or in other fast-paced Conversations, where I’m unable to take good notes, if any. Sometimes I have half notes on a Notes app or something because I don’t want to forget.
In general, focus on the main things and let noise drift to the side. Here is some advice I have for handling each of these situations, and examples of how I handled them while at Right of Boom this past February.
Session Notes
In general, any live note-taking completed by you should be about action, not mindless transcription. There are AI transcribers like Otter.ai or Plaud.ai for that. Your goal should be three-fold:
- gathering the big points and the nuance of the conversation
- collecting data points and future research opportunities and
- identifying how those fit in with your goals or understanding.
Keep your notes high-level; focus on engaging in the sessions and ask questions. Write just enough to help jog your memory or find the source information later. If you wrote out your own questions in the planning phase, those can help guide your notes as well, or give you questions to ask when they open up the mic.
Here is a snippet from my notes I took in Brent Adamson’s session on the Framemaking Sale.
As you see in my notes here, yes, take photos, but where do those go when you’re done? Do you review them? Really?
Put that information somewhere useful, friend. Here are few things you can do to help shape your notes:
- Use OCR. The notes under Dimensions of Customer Decision Confidence, I did not type. I took a photo and then grabbed the text from that image. Your device may have OCR built into the camera app.
- Use Reverse Image Search. Find Images online that speakers referenced, through reverse image search. They will be better quality AND will often bring you to the source material the speaker used.
- Capture concepts that will be hard to track down later. Did they mention a data point or statistic? What was the source for that? What was the exact number?
- What do you think? What concepts do you agree with? What do you disagree with? What makes you feel uncomfortable? What do you want to learn more about?
- Review before you leave your seat. Before getting up from a session, take 5 minutes and catch up on your notes. Don’t make a big deal of it, it doesn’t have to be perfect, just scrub through them to make sure they’ll make sense for “future you” when it’s time to review them.
Conversation Notes
Taking notes on conversations is a lot harder. Who did you talk to and what did you talk about? Where were you? What actionable things can you remember, jokes, or meaningful things about that situation?
The Networking and Vendor sections are a lot lighter because they should be. Hopefully, you are living in the moment and connecting with these thoughts and ideas you discussed over a meal and worrying less about getting notes from these experiences. The point of these notes are to remind yourself of the important stories or experiences you had with someone, to build camaraderie and sometimes wise insight that these strangers-turned-friends-and-colleagues shared with you.
For conversation notes, I would encourage you to take notes you can, by texting or sending yourself a brief message through Teams/Slack, or recording a voice memo. Sometimes, I also just message my business partner if it’s a particularly lovely exchange.
Also, make sure you connect with that person, by social media, email, or business card. As with the Session Notes, triage throughout the day, or at the very least at the end of the day/beginning of the next to make sure all of your notes end up in one place.
These are my notes from a recent conference, with enough redacted so you can see what I do, but enough showing so you can see I am not perfect or 100%. I didn't fill in some of the blanks as I've mentioned in later segments, I’m not building dossiers, I’m only writing out just enough information to jog my memory. Some of the experiences were highly memorable, so the names were enough.
In the end, the most important thing for your notes is that they are here for you to return to at any time during the conference. If you’ve done the pre-work of laying it out, you don’t have to expend energy to get back on track. You just find the next session or meal and pick it back up again.
Transition Power Hour: Prioritize and Process
It’s the last day of the conference. You are exhausted and it’s time to pack up and hit the road.
I’d argue that THIS is the most important time in this entire document, this liminal space between education and action that will determine if you actually learn anything from this event!
Before things get “Back to Normal,” it is vital that you take the time to review your notes, whether alone or as a team. Here’s how I do it:
- Give yourself One Hour (or less) to Clean up.
Before heading home or within 24 hours of landing back in reality, spend one dedicated hour to intentionally review your notes. This isn’t deep work, it’s just filling in the blanks where you forgot or didn’t have time/energy to upkeep things.
- Fill in missing details. While things are still fresh, make sure there are enough notes to make your notes make sense. Take out things that don’t make sense or that aren’t actually actionable or useful.
- Highlight key takeaways that actually matter. (Do this by hand before running through genAI! Don’t let a robot tell you what was important from your experience!)
- Extract action items. Do this religiously, even if it's just "Follow up with $Name from $Company." Add them to a separate, trackable document:
- Use genAI to organize and identify the big ideas. On each page of this document, I have questions. Drop the summary and your notes for each session in a genAI of your choice and have it analyze the event for you. Then, at the end, have it analyze the conference as you attended it!
Here is what I distilled the Business Track at Right of Boom into.
I fed genAI each session with a few questions, and then fed the outputs together into genAI for the "Big Ideas" and then I edited them down and removed 2-3 points and subpoints I felt were unneccesary.
Back to Reality: Notes into Action.
There it is, you have your nice, neat notes reflecting what you learned at a Conference! Now...what...what do you do with them?
Share the Knowledge with your Team
- What sessions were actually valuable? (And which were a waste of time?)
- Is this a good event for you to attend again next year, or is there someone else who would be a better fit?
- What key industry trends did you notice?
- Are there any immediate action items?
- If you can present ONE THING to implement immediately, what would it be? Make a plan to do it.
Follow Up with Friends, new and old.
Debrief with your friends who also attended. What did they get out of the event that you missed? Be ruthless about which product you’re going to try from which vendor following this event and stick with it. Go ahead and write up a short “sorry not interested, do not contact" template email to send to vendors, or email rules to send them to another folder/trash. (You can always come back to them, give them a clear templated no and move on!)
Share the knowledge with others.
I mean, my notes from Right of Boom literally led to two (maybe three) blog posts on getting the most out of conferences, a video, and probably a webinar reviewing content as well. There is a depth of knowledge that comes from diverse conversations on topics, don’t be scared to have opinions or speak your mind, you never know how that can help our entire industry in the long run! Make videos, blogposts, or LinkedIn Articles. Share the wealth with others who couldn’t make it. Who knows, it may be helpful to you, to help you sort out your ideas better.
In Closing
My goal in sharing with you how I take conferences notes, is to encourage YOU to get the most out of your conference attendance. However you do that is up to you, but hopefully this framework helps you practically implement how you can best ideate, execute, and close out your event experiences with Action in mind. Remember:
- Know your Why before you go and invest energy upfront to give yourself structure you can use.
- Keep it Simple and come back to Notes whenever you stray.
- Finish Strong and transition back to reality, prioritizing Action.
If you take nothing else, I hope you consider that a conference isn’t just about showing up. Instead, it’s about capturing insights, making connections, and turning those ideas into action. Take notes that matter, review them before they fade into oblivion, and for the love of all things good, do something with them!
As Partner and Business Consultant at Rising Tide, I help organizations align culture with efficiency, bridging the gap between strategy and the everyday systems that make it work. I’ve spent my career leading diverse, cross-functional teams and building communities where people actually want to learn and collaborate. With roots in technology, education, user experience & design, and project management, I specialize in turning complex ideas into clear, actionable plans that keep both people and projects thriving.
Outside of work, you’ll usually find me weight-training, gardening, or rewatching Doctor Who with a cat in my lap.
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For easier tracking, check out haloreleases.remmy.dev to filter and search HaloPSA updates by ID, version, and keyword.
Added an option to Service Level Agreements to enable a different First Response Target to Subsequent Responses | v2.208 #988897 | 2:04
Adds an SLA option so your first response target can differ from subsequent response targets.
- Better reflects triage vs ongoing comms
- Cleaner SLA reporting for service teams
Added the FAQ List Ticket field as an available option for workflow automation criteria | v2.208 #987268 | 6:13
Adds the FAQ List Ticket field as a workflow criteria option.
- Enables knowledge-base-driven workflow logic
- Helps route/handle KB-related ticket workflows more precisely
Added a Chat Profile setting to allow the update of the End User of Tickets linked to an Anonymous Chat if the haloChat_inboundEvent_upgradeAnonChat is successfully called | v2.208 #984332 | 7:31
Allows ticket end-user updates when an anonymous chat is successfully upgraded.
- Improves attribution of chat-created tickets
- Reduces manual cleanup after anonymous-to-known identity transitions
Added a "Clock in, Clock out" widget for Shifts | v2.208 #984138 | 8:00
Adds a clock in/clock out widget for Shifts.
- Helps formalize on-duty time tracking
- Useful for after-hours / on-call patterns
Added a 2 monthly schedule period option | v2.208 #979982 | 10:45
Adds a 2-month schedule period option.
- Supports bi-monthly billing cadences
- Reduces schedule workarounds
Added multiple improvements to Knowledge Base latest article links | v2.208 #979751 | 10:59
Improves Knowledge Base latest article links.
- More consistent KB navigation as articles change/version
- Helps avoid “stale link” confusion
Added the option 'Visible - Read Only' to Agent Asset details screen visibility | v2.208 #979737 | 11:49
Adds “Visible - Read Only” for Agent Asset details visibility.
- Lets agents view key fields without editing
- Supports tighter asset governance
You can now configure a ticket to load balance upon reopening if the assigned agent does not meet the mandatory qualification matching criteria | v2.208 #979563 | 12:53
Adds load-balance on reopen if assigned agent doesn’t meet qualification rules.
- Keeps qualification matching consistent over the ticket lifecycle
- Helps avoid “reopen back to wrong resource” situations
Added a module for an integration with Opinyin | v2.208 #978437 | 13:06
Introduces a module for an Opinyin integration.
- Relevant if Opinyin is part of your customer feedback stack
- Worth evaluating for review/feedback workflow alignment
You can now send test emails for individual Mail Campaign email messages | v2.208 #977085 | 13:42
Adds test email sending for individual mail campaign messages.
- Helps validate content before sending live
- Reduces campaign mistakes
Added multiple new Halo API Actions in runbooks | v2.208 #974932 | 13:50
Adds new Halo API actions in runbooks.
- Expands no-code/low-code automation options
- Reduces dependency on custom calls in some workflows
Added a new setting to split Knowledge Base view counts. When enabled, the End-User portal shows only User views | v2.208 #971344 | 14:52
Splits KB view counts so end users see only user views (when enabled).
- Cleaner end-user analytics
- Separates agent/internal browsing from customer consumption
Added item group restrictions and a running cost total when adding items to new tickets on the self-service portal. | v2.208 #971032 | 15:27
Adds item group restrictions + running cost total on portal ticket item selection.
- Better guardrails for what customers can request
- More transparent cost expectations while building a request
Added a Ticket Reference field that can be searched and included in column profiles | v2.208 #968004 | 17:39
Adds a Ticket Reference field that’s searchable and usable in column profiles.
- Helpful for ITSM-style reference formats
- Improves filtering and reporting in list views
Service subscribers are now grouped | v2.208 #963508 | 18:56
Groups service subscribers.
- Improves clarity around AND/OR logic in subscriber conditions
- Makes complex subscriber setups easier to maintain
Added dollar variables ($) CONTRACTSLA, CONTRACTSUBTYPE & CONTRACTSTATUS | v2.208 #935851 | 19:55
Adds $ variables for CONTRACTSLA, CONTRACTSUBTYPE, CONTRACTSTATUS.
- Improves template and workflow flexibility
- Useful for notifications, templates, and automations
Improvements to Agent Resource Booking | v2.208 #935781 | 20:00
Adds improvements to Agent Resource Booking.
- Enhances appointment booking workflows
- Helpful if you’re trying to reduce reliance on external schedulers
Added options to encrypt variables and responses in Custom integration methods & Runbooks | v2.208 #882510 | 21:41
Adds encryption options for variables/responses in integrations/runbooks.
- Better security for sensitive values used in automations
- Especially relevant for API keys and secrets
You can now set an expiry date for software against an asset | v2.208 #880465 | 22:33
Adds software expiry date tracking on assets.
- Supports proactive renewals
- Enables automation around expiring software
Added a ticket type level setting that can allow you to show/hide approval actions for end-users. | v2.208 #859228 | 22:54
Adds ticket-type control for end-user approval action visibility.
- Keeps the portal cleaner where approvals aren’t relevant
- Useful for differentiating internal vs customer-facing ticket types
Added functionality for team leaders to modify their agents’ preferences | v2.208 #855276 | 23:07
Allows team leaders to modify agents’ preferences.
- Supports delegation without full admin access
- Helpful in scaled team structures
Added the ability to bulk add assets to a ticket via the asset search modal screen | v2.208 #835383 | 27:26
Adds bulk add assets via the asset search modal.
- Speeds up multi-asset incident/service request logging
- Reduces repetitive clicking
Added the ability to set a chat profile override at user role level | v2.208 #834258 | 28:11
Adds chat profile overrides at the user role level.
- Standardizes chat behavior by role
- Helps maintain consistency across teams
FAQ lists can now be included in Knowledge Base links and will auto-expand on open | v2.208 #833936 | 30:24
Allows KB links to include FAQ lists and auto-expand on open.
- Faster navigation into the exact FAQ content you want
- Helpful for portal/self-serve KB UX
You can now specify HTML when setting a pop up note on a ticket rule | v2.208 #825950 | 30:38
Allows HTML formatting in popup notes triggered by ticket rules.
- Create more readable/structured internal guidance
- Useful for critical warnings, prompts, and process reminders
Credit notes are now displayed along side invoices on the self service portal | v2.208 #806488 | 33:34
Shows credit notes alongside invoices in the portal.
- Improves billing clarity for customers
- Reduces confusion during reconciliation
Added a new setting to limit agents and users to one active session | v2.208 #761279 | 33:52
Adds a setting to limit users/agents to one active session.
- Helpful for security and account-sharing prevention
- Supports tighter access governance
Added TD Synnex Quote Line Imports | v2.208 #698431 | 34:03
Adds TD Synnex Quote Line Imports.
- Speeds quote building for MSPs using TD Synnex
- Reduces manual entry errors
Added the ability to set specific colours for counters widgets when using dark mode | v2.208 #681842 | 34:07
Adds dark mode counter widget color options.
- Improves readability for dark mode users
- Helps dashboard clarity
It is now possible to create downpayment invoices from Sales Orders for both fixed price hardware/projects and time and materials projects | v2.208 #596243 | 34:26
Adds downpayment invoice creation from sales orders (fixed price + T&M).
- Useful for upfront deposits on projects/hardware
- Supports cashflow management
Added multiple settings in Self Service Portal settings to limit options to the Web Access Level list | v2.208 #436892 | 35:29
Adds settings to limit portal options to Web Access Level list values.
- Reduces risk of accidental “too broad” portal access
- Makes permissioning more controllable
Added the ability to use access control for reports | v2.208 #262984 | 37:46
Adds access control for reports.
- Lock down sensitive financial/ops reporting
- Useful for larger MSPs with more role separation
End of 2.208 Q/A and Cats! On to 2.210 | 41:59
When using the Addigy integration a button will show on devices imported to open the device in Addigy | v2.210 #1054688 | 46:52
Adds a deep link button on imported Addigy devices.
- Faster navigation between Halo and Addigy
- Reduces context switching for techs
Multiple changes made to the Expenses list | v2.210 #1053141 | 47:06
Multiple changes made to the Expenses list.
- Improves list usability and admin workflows
- Helpful if you use Halo expenses operationally
Halo Portal and Agent application (including dashboards) iframes can now be embedded in SharePoint pages | v2.210 #1051449 | 47:32
Allows embedding Halo portal/agent UI (including dashboards) in SharePoint via iframe.
- Useful for intranet-style “single pane” access
- Supports internal operational dashboards
A setting has been added to Recurring Invoice configuration so that Recurring Invoices appear in the Ready for Invoice list and are auto-created (if enabled) if the next creation date falls in the current/selected month | v2.210 #1051296 | 47:58
Changes how recurring invoices appear/create based on month selection.
- Impacts finance workflows—review before enabling
- Useful for month-based invoice planning
A setting has been added to Contract/Agreement configuration that will ensure when adding a Billing Plan Combination using a Billing Template a record will be added for each matching Contract/Agreement | v2.210 #1050626 | 48:32
Ensures billing template application creates a billing plan record per matching contract/agreement.
- Helps when contracts renew/change and you still need accurate billing mapping
- Reduces edge cases in contract-driven billing
Additional import fields have been added to the NinjaOne Device import - Last Contacted and Created Date | v2.210 #1050486 | 51:33
Adds Last Contacted + Created Date fields to NinjaOne device import.
- Enables stale-device reporting (offline 30/60/90 days)
- Supports cleanup and license optimization workflows
A setting has been added to Ticket/Opportunity Types so that the "Send" button can be removed from the Quote screen, so that the Quote can only be sent from the Ticket/Opportunity | v2.210 #1049474 | 54:04
Removes quote “Send” button so sending happens only via ticket/opportunity.
- Enforces process consistency
- Reduces accidental sends from the quote screen
A setting has been added to the Asset Field properties so that Change History records are not created for the Asset Field | v2.210 #1048570 | 54:35
Disables change history tracking for selected asset fields.
- Prevents noisy logs on frequently updated fields
- Helps keep asset records cleaner long-term
A permission has been introduced for Users and User Roles so that Invoice access can be restricted to No Access/Site/Client | v2.210 #1048548 | 55:32
Adds invoice access restriction levels (No Access/Site/Client).
- Tightens financial visibility controls
- Useful for role-based access separation
If an overriding Contract/Agreement is set against a Ticket but not configured to show in the Field List then it will still show but only administrators will be able to edit/update the field | v2.210 #1046935 | 56:13
Shows the overriding contract field even if it isn’t on the field list (admin-editable only).
- Makes hidden billing context visible for troubleshooting
- Reduces “why isn’t billing applying?” mysteries
Database Lookup functionality can now be used when entering an action using the self-service portal | v2.210 #1046459 | 56:58
Enables database lookup while entering an action in the self-service portal.
- Makes portal actions more dynamic and guided
- Useful for structured self-service inputs
Updated Account Integrator released that is compatible with Sage UK v32 (2026) | v2.210 #1046181 | 57:14
Updates the Account Integrator for Sage UK v32 (2026).
- Relevant for Sage UK accounting users
- Helps keep finance integrations current
A setting has been added to allow the Ticket entities to be added to a separate group when creating invoices in the "Ready for Invoicing" area | v2.210 #1044974 | 57:32
Adds a setting to group ticket entities separately during invoice creation.
- May improve invoice grouping/organization depending on your billing setup
- Worth testing in “Ready for Invoicing” workflow
By the [run]Book: Episode 14
In Episode 14 of By the [run]Book, Mendy and Robbie wrap up v2.206 and break down v2.208, covering key workflow, billing, automation, and portal enhancements. From smarter qualification matching to better project–contract alignment and deeper portal customization, this episode helps MSPs tighten operations and improve control inside HaloPSA.
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In Episode 14 of By the [run]Book, Mendy and Robbie wrap up v2.206 and dive into v2.208. Join us while they unpack a dense set of workflow, billing, automation, and self-service portal enhancements. Highlights include conditional workflow steps, improved qualification matching, project–contract alignment, and powerful new portal customization options. This episode is ideal for MSPs who want tighter operational control, cleaner billing, and more flexible automation inside HaloPSA.
The following features stand out as a few of the impactful changes:
On-call Notification Enhancements #422926
Halo introduced various enhancements to notifications to better support on-call workflows, and Mendy called out that this release note quietly included a massive underlying change. The key takeaway was that important platform-impacting updates can be buried in “notification” notes, so MSPs running on-call should review notification behavior closely after updating.
Assign Contract to Projects & Tasks Created from Sales Orders #1027598
Projects and tasks created from sales orders can now automatically inherit the contract created from that sales order, tightening the link between quoting, delivery, and billing. The hosts emphasized this as a practical fix for MSPs who see project time accidentally hitting the wrong agreement (and wrecking profitability reporting), especially when doing fixed-fee or prepaid project work.
Workflow Automations Using Client/Site/User Custom Fields #1022399
Workflow automations can now use client, site, or user custom fields directly as criteria, reducing the need for workaround runbooks that copy those values onto tickets. The hosts positioned this as a meaningful automation upgrade because it makes routing and logic cleaner, easier to maintain, and more scalable for MSPs with account-specific processes.
Watch Now: By the [run]Book: Episode 14
For easier tracking, check out haloreleases.remmy.dev to filter and search HaloPSA updates by ID, version, and keyword.
Full Feature List:
Added the ability to add Azure/Entra distribution groups as followers | v2.206 #770320 | 1:52
- Allows Entra distribution groups to be added as followers on tickets
- Reduces manual follower management as staff change
- Useful for shared service desks or group-based visibility
Added an option in AI settings to generate an AI summary of the article based on the title, description and resolution Added an option in AI settings to use the AI-generated summary of an article to identify and flag potential duplicate articles before submission | v2.206 #767579 | 2:58
- Automatically generates AI summaries for KB articles
- Uses AI summaries to detect potential duplicate articles
- Improves knowledge base quality and search accuracy
When tickets have a Teams chat open, if the ticket is closed, a closure message will be sent to all chats | v2.206 #635732 | 3:29
- Sends an automated closure message into active Teams chats
- Helps cleanly close collaboration threads
- Reduces post-resolution confusion
Various enhancements to notifications to support on-call notifications | v2.206 #422926 | 4:02
- Improves reliability of on-call notification handling
- Important for MSPs running scheduled on-call rotations
- Includes underlying workflow/notification behavior improvements
A setting has been added to Sales Order Configuration so that a specific Status can be set once all Items on the Sales Order are consigned | v2.208 #1034330 | 10:24
- Automatically updates Sales Order status after consignment
- Reduces manual order lifecycle management
- Keeps order views accurate
The setting "Tickets with the default Organisation/Site must be moved before working on the Ticket" can now be overridden at Ticket Type level | v2.208 #1033540 | 12:51
- Allows specific ticket types to bypass the default org/site restriction
- Useful during intake and triage workflows
- Prevents inconsistent admin vs engineer experience
"Do not disturb" mode for Halo notifications | v2.208 #1028655 | 16:04
- Enables agents to temporarily suppress notifications
- Requires global setting to allow toggle
- Useful for focused work sessions
A setting "When creating Projects and Tasks assign the Contract created from the Sales Order" has been added to Configuration > Sales Orders > Processing Sales Order Lines that allocates Projects and Tasks created from Sales Orders to the Contract created from the Sales Order | v2.208 #1027598 | 17:27
- Ensures project time is tied to the correct contract
- Prevents agreement profitability distortion
- Reduces manual reassignment after project creation
An Item property had been added to the Milestone so that the Invoice Item can be edited/set after creation of the Milestone. This Item will be used when creating an Invoice directly for the Milestone only | v2.208 #1027578 | 20:33
- Allows invoice item changes after milestone creation
- Improves billing flexibility
- Applies when invoicing milestones directly
Added Canned Text Shortcuts for Chat | v2.208 #1024945 | 23:07
- Adds keyboard shortcuts for canned text in chat
- Speeds up repetitive internal communication
- Configured at the canned text level
Additional data has been added to the Invoice Line object to store the Origin Sales Order Line that the associated Recurring Invoice was created from and to store the Occurrence Count for Recurring Invoices | v2.208 #1024614 | 28:23
- Improves recurring invoice traceability
- Tracks original Sales Order line
- Stores occurrence count for reporting
Report display improvement when using customised table html | v2.208 #1024326 | 28:55
- Improves horizontal scroll behavior
- Reduces layout cutoff issues
- Enhances report usability
Added Managed Identity via Azure Arc as an authentication option to the Microsoft Entra integration and Office 365 mailboxes | v2.208 #1024317 | 29:36
- Provides a more secure authentication option
- Reduces credential storage risk
- Supports Azure-first environments
It is now possible to set a Tax Exemption reason for a Halo Customer on creation that will be pushed to Quickbooks when the Customer is not taxable | v2.208 #1024297 | 29:44
- Syncs tax exemption reason to QuickBooks
- Improves finance consistency
- Reduces manual adjustments
A setting has been added to allow recurring invoice lines to be hidden by default when viewing the recurring invoice | v2.208 #1024067 | 29:57
- Keeps recurring invoice views cleaner
- Allows hidden lines to be revealed when required
- Reduces confusion from legacy lines
Multiple changes to available $ variables | v2.208 #1023687 | 32:18
- Expands formatting flexibility
- Adds additional address/currency options
- Reduces need for template workarounds
Added the setting 'Automatically create Change Advise Boards from Teams' to Approval Process settings | v2.208 #1023311 | 32:55
- Syncs CAB boards with Teams membership
- Reduces manual approval admin
- Supports structured change management
A setting has been added to the QuickBooks Integrations setup so that a Closed Date can be entered. | v2.208 #1022558 | 33:16
- Helps protect closed accounting periods
- Prevents retroactive invoice sync edits
You can now use Client, Site or User Custom Fields for criteria on Workflow Automations | v2.208 #1022399 | 33:41
- Enables cleaner automation logic
- Removes need to copy custom field data onto tickets
- Improves routing flexibility
The variable $ SERVICEID can be used in database lookups to obtain the ID of the Service linked to the Ticket | v2.208 #1021534 | 34:21
- Enables service-aware database lookups
- Improves reporting and automation precision
Custom Statistics Tables added | v2.208 #1019726 | 34:32
- Allows scheduled SQL results to be stored over time
- Enables trending metrics within Halo
- Useful for backlog and performance tracking
Decimals are now allowed within the field "Tickets Opened/Closed within the last X days" in AI suggestions | v2.208 #1018082 | 37:42
- Allows finer tuning of AI suggestion windows
- Improves duplicate detection precision
Added a new Knowledge Base setting that allows you to hide FAQ tiles that have no results matching the current search in the Portal | v2.208 #1012783 | 37:50
- Removes empty FAQ tiles during searches
- Improves portal UX
Added a manufacturer field to the suppliers tab of assets | v2.208 #1009501 | 37:57
- Improves asset detail and reporting
- Enhances supplier tracking
Improvements to Qualification matching | v2.208 #1008143 | 38:01
- Improves load balancing logic
- Reduces tickets sticking with unqualified agents
Various improvements to the self-service portal | v2.208 #1007918 | 40:49
- Navigation improvements
- Quick access to My Tickets / My Approvals / My Assets
- Cleaner layout
You can now use Client, Site, User and Organisation level $ variables in the Self Service Portal custom HTML Headers and Footer | v2.208 #1007759 | 43:43
- Enables dynamic, client-specific portal content
- Useful for escalation paths and account manager info
Enhancement to Client-Ticket Type restrictions | v2.208 #1006158 | 47:49
- Updates restriction handling behavior
- Important to review before enabling if already configured
Added a Chat Audit Area Added a new Chat Transcript style | v2.208 #1004851 | 48:34
- Improves audit visibility
- Enhances transcript formatting
You can now set feedback and survey links to be single use | v2.208 #1002898 | 48:41
- Reduces automated survey submissions
- Improves feedback accuracy
Added an Advanced Setting to alter the Tree menu width | v2.208 #999276 | 51:57
- Improves navigation readability
- Useful for long names
You can now make your custom hompage HTML in the End-User portal appear as a sticky banner across all portal pages | v2.208 #996323 | 52:48
- Ideal for outage banners and announcements
- Keeps messaging visible across pages
Added option to exclude non-invoiceable time from budget calculations | v2.208 #994004 | 56:01
- Improves project budget accuracy
- Separates invoiceable vs non-invoiceable effort
Rising Tide Book Club: Think Naked - Week 2
In Chapter 2 of Think Naked, Marco Marsan argues that adults don’t lose creativity: they’re conditioned out of it. This Rising Tide book club discussion explores fear, conformity, unexamined rules, and why real learning requires play, safety, and curiosity in modern organizations.
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About this Series
This discussion guide is part of Rising Tide’s Winter 2026 book club, where we’re reading Think Naked by Marco Marsan.
If you’re just joining us, here are a few pages you’ll likely benefit from:
- Book Clubs, Conversations, and Curiosity for why we started a book club for a technical team here
Chapter Summary
“If you want to be more creative, stay in part a child, with the creativity and invention that characterizes children before they are deformed by adult society” - Jean Piaget
In Chapter 2, You Lost Your Marbles, Marco Marsan explores how people don’t simply “grow out” of creativity — they are systematically conditioned out of it. The chapter argues that over time, fear, rigid rules, institutional norms, and social conformity slowly strip away curiosity, playfulness, and experimentation.
Marsan frames this loss through several forces:
- Fear: mistakes become costly as adults (financially, socially, professionally)
- Senseless rules: norms persist long after their original context or usefulness
- Institutionalized regurgitation: being rewarded for having the “right answer” rather than learning how to think
- Tough-it-out culture: endurance replaces reflection
- Numbness: accumulated stress and responsibility dull engagement
The chapter opens with a consulting story where a leader dismisses Marsan outright, using it as a framing device to explore how organizations often reject discomfort, challenge, and unconventional thinking — even when they claim to want innovation.
Discussion Questions
Use these open-ended prompts to guide reflection and conversation. Remember, there are no right answers!
- What does “losing your marbles” mean to you — and what might you have lost that still matters?
- 'Lose Your Marbles' Saying - Meaning & Context
- Rather than meaning “you’ve gone crazy,” the group explored the older meaning: marbles as something valuable children possessed — and something adults may have lost, not gained, over time.
- Where have fear or consequences made curiosity feel unsafe? How do power and authority shape how you show up creatively?
- How often do you ask why a rule exists, rather than whether you’re allowed to challenge it?
- Where have institutions (school, work, industry norms) rewarded compliance over thinking?
- What would play look like in your work if you weren’t worried about being wrong?
Rising Tide Input for your Consideration
- Your brain is capable of great creativity and capacity. How you use it matters. Here is some research behind some of the concepts Marsan mentions.
- Creativity and Learning require play — and play requires safety.
- We discussed Montessori education, language learning, or professional growth, the group emphasized that playfulness, repetition, and “looking silly” are critical to learning and are exactly what adults are trained to avoid.
- Conformity isn’t safety, it’s a creativity suppressor.
- The group referenced classic psychology experiments (Stanford Prison Experiment, Milgram Experiment) to explore how authority, group pressure, and institutional roles can override personal judgment and moral reasoning. Stanford prison experiment - Wikipedia
- Dead Poets Society - Conformity Scene (1989) HD w/ Subtitles
- https://youtu.be/GDWAKvQemlU?si=AVbkNGLEhC8vn7KV
- Organizational Culture and the 5 Monkeys Experiment | Intersol
- Are rules ever useful?
- Rules are not inherently bad, but we propose that unexamined rules are dangerous. There are rules that deliver shared value and coordination, but there are also rules that persist simply because “that’s how it’s done”
- A recurring Rising Tide pattern emerged: looking for the rule beneath the rule (the underlying reason a rule exists) rather than accepting it at face value.
- As Marsan suggests, “Any Rule represents, at best, the latest thinking on a subject,” but we also considered that a rule represents what was left over from an unfinished discussion, and not even the best answer. It just reflects the last time someone argued about something and not a timeless truth.
- Rules are not inherently bad, but we propose that unexamined rules are dangerous. There are rules that deliver shared value and coordination, but there are also rules that persist simply because “that’s how it’s done”
- Learning is experiential, not transactional.
- We discussed how conformity, rote memorization, and “teaching for the test” suppress critical thinking and actual learning in many modern educational systems.
- True learning involves play, repetition, discomfort, and curiosity, all of which feel inefficient or risky in adult systems optimized for output.
About Rising Tide and our Book Club
Rising Tide helps MSPs and service-focused teams build better systems: the kind that align people with purpose.
Every Friday at 9:30 AM ET, we host Rising Tide Fridays as an open conversation for MSP owners, consultants, and service professionals who want to grow both professionally, technically, and emotionally. In Winter/Spring 2026, we’re walking through Think Naked.
If that sounds like your kind of crowd, reach out to partners@risingtidegroup.net for the Teams link. Bring your coffee and curiosity…no prep required.