Many tools used by people who support others share a familiar feature: a list of names, each with a coloured dot beside it. Green means on track. Amber means keep an eye on them. Red means needs attention.
It's easy to see the appeal. A busy practitioner, tutor or team lead can glance at the screen and know where to look first. We understand why it exists.
We still don't think software should do it.
A colour hides the reason
Red can mean a hard week. It can mean a missed appointment because the bus didn't come. It can mean something serious. On the screen, they all look the same.
The colour tells us something was flagged, but not what, or why, or whether it matters. To find that out, someone has to look past the colour anyway.
Colours stick
Once someone has been amber for a while, it's hard to see them any other way. People see the dot before they see the person, and conversations start from the status rather than from what's actually happening.
That's how a passing state turns into a label. It happens quietly, and nobody means it to.
Green isn't the same as fine
A green dot feels reassuring. But often it only means nothing was flagged, and that's not the same as everything being well. Some of the people who most need attention are the ones who never trip a rule.
The judgement moves to the wrong place
The person supporting someone knows things no rule can capture: how they sounded today, what's changed at home, what a good week looks like for them.
When software hands out colours, that knowledge starts to come second. It's natural to trust the light, especially when we're busy. Over time the tool is making the call, and the person who actually knows is checking its work.
We think it should be the other way round.
What we'd rather see
Instead of a verdict, we'd rather see a tool show what happened, in plain words: what was planned, what took place, and what the person said about it. Then it should leave the meaning to the people involved.
That's slower than a glance at a coloured dot. But it keeps the judgement with the person who knows the person, and it keeps everyone being seen as more than a status.
More than a status
Nobody is red, amber or green. People have hard weeks and good ones, setbacks and quiet progress, and things that don't fit any category.
Good support already knows that. We think the tools around it should too.