Review the Preferred Name functionality, how to expose throughout the site, include in reports and notifications.
Certificate and Certified PDF Functionality
Introduction
Preferred Name is a field on the person profile which can be used to articulate a professional's preferred first name. This field exists across customer sites, similar to that of standard fields First Name, Last Name, Email and Username. This field differs from organization specific Custom Fields as Preferred Name is a field that will now be available to use across any customer site.
Preferred Name can be used to document a professional's preferred first name, it can be included in LCvista reports, exposed in any user-facing notifications and firms can choose to preferentially use this value, instead of First Name, across user-facing menus in LCvista.
Read further to learn more about the behavior of this new field.
People
Within the Properties tab of each individual profile, a new field Preferred Name will be visible beneath the existing First and Last Name fields. This field is not required and can continue to be left blank should your organization choose not to utilize this value.
Settings
Within the Settings menu, under tab User Experience, a new setting for Display Preferred Name across user-facing menus will be visible. Enable this setting if it is your organizations preference to show Preferred Name in all user-facing menus instead of the First Name documented within a professional's account. In cases where an individual does not have a Preferred Name documented, First Name will always be the default, even when this new setting has been turned on.
When this setting is enabled, and a professional does have a Preferred Name documented, they will be greeted by this value in the following user-facing areas:
- the User profile (visible on the top right section of the form)
- the User Profile menu (visible in the drop down available under the professional's name)
- a professional's Compliance Summary and Compliance Detail
- a professional's Transcript
- Instructors with a preferred name documented will also be referred to by their Preferred Name within the Instructor list visible from a program's preview page.
Reports
Administrators will have full access to report on this new value in all user-related reports, including the People report, Compliance reports, Assignment reports, Learning Plan reports and more. Learn more about Reports, here.
Notifications
Administrators will have access to include a new email tag for $Preferred_Name on all notifications that can be sent to professionals, including assignment, completion, enrollment and deadline notifications. In cases where you have included $Preferred_Name in your notification templates, but where an individual does not have a Preferred Name documented, we will revert to showing the First Name value.
Learn more about Notifications, here.
Bulk Uploads
Administrators will have access to add and modify this value in bulk through our Bulk Upload: People workflow. This new field will exist as a new column that can be populated or modified on the People bulk upload template and processed in bulk. Learn more about our Bulk Upload: People workflow, here, and our Bulk Upload process in general, here.
Certificate and Certified PDF Functionality
The new Preferred Name field will not have an impact on official documents that can be retrieved from LCvista. Specifically, Certificates of Completion and any Certified PDF documents exported out of the site will continue to reference the First Name value on a professional's profile.