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Sidekick
Josie avatar
Written by Josie
Updated over 6 months ago


What is Sidekick?

Introducing Sidekick - your very own AI-powered writing assistant designed to make writing Newsfeed posts and Messages a breeze. Sidekick checks over your writing to correct any pesky spelling or grammar mistakes, suggests adjustments to your tone, and speeds up your writing process.

For an overview of just how helpful Sidekick can be, check out what Matt has to say about it below:

Sidekick is a part of our Professional package and can be purchased as an add-on to our Premium and Foundation packages in the Famly store for £19 per month. Just click on the Famly store icon in your sidebar to find it!


Sidekick Permissions

Once toggled on in your Settings, Sidekick is automatically enabled for all staff members to use. If you are on a package where you can edit permissions, you can control the permission to use Sidekick for certain roles if you'd like. To so do, head to Settings → Staff → Compare Permissions → Communication & Events → check or uncheck Can use Sidekick.

💡 If you are a setting that's part of a larger organisation, keep in mind that staff members with the permission to use Sidekick in one setting can use it in all settings that have it enabled. Even if they do not have permission to use Sidekick in another setting

Once enabled, the Sidekick button will appear in the bottom left corner of any Newsfeed post or Message you go to write. To start using Sidekick, click on the button and start exploring some of the text adjustment options it has to offer.

At the moment, you'll be able to make use of Sidekick in the following places

  • When drafting a Newsfeed post

  • When writing Messages in your messaging inbox

  • In the newest version of Child Development when drafting Observations, Assessments, and Two-year checks

Sidekick is available on both the desktop version of Famly and the app - just make sure your app has been updated!


What can Sidekick help with?

Sidekick can adjust the text in your posts and messages to:

  • Improve your writing

  • Correct grammar and spelling

  • Make it shorter

  • Make it professional

  • Make it polite

  • Make it descriptive (in older versions, you may see descriptive being referred to as observant - but don't worry, the output will be exactly the same)

  • Make it conversational

By selecting Suggest a different option, you can browse through even more prompts for adjusting the tone of your text.

You can change the output by clicking Try again to update the suggested text. Click Apply suggestion to enter it. If you're not satisfied with Sidekick's output, please do leave us with some feedback. See the next section for how best to do this.

Please note, rich text will be removed if you have applied it before using Sidekick - so we suggest using Sidekick first, before bolding, italicising, etc.!


Limitations

Artificial intelligence and machine learning are rapidly evolving fields of study. As with any new rapidly developing technology, there are some limitations to AI and the Sidekick feature.

Limitations may occur because of many different reasons, such as narrow inputs, systemic biases and a limited quantity of training data. If you are using Sidekick, your data is for example not used to train the AI and this approach has been taken as a step to protect personal data that may be processed by using the feature.

This means that the Sidekick feature may:

  • Give you output that is wrong and does not match the input

  • Give you output that is inaccurate or misleading

  • Give you output that contains harmful information

  • Give you output that is biased and/or discriminating

So, it is very important that you carefully read and review the output that is generated by the Sidekick feature. It’s also good practice to review the text you want to use as an input before you request the Sidekick feature to generate an output.

As the AI and machine learning technology develops the better it gets and we’ll also work on making our Sidekick feature better. You can always give us feedback by either giving a direct feedback to the output by clicking “report issue” or by clicking “suggest a different option” when giving instructions for the delivery of the output (available on desktop only).


FAQ

Frequently asked questions about Sidekick and how to use it

  • Can I turn it off again?

    • Yes

  • Can parents use Sidekick?

    • No

  • Can parents see that we’re using Sidekick?

    • Currently, there is no indication for parents that you’re using Sidekick

  • Can I use Sidekick in more than one nursery if I'm part of an organisation?

    • Yes! However, Sidekick will only show up if it's enabled for all nurseries that you have access to. For example, if you are a manager in two nurseries (within the same organisation or in different organisations), both will need to have Sidekick enabled for you to use it in either nursery

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