OpenWater Application and Review Cloud Reviews & Product Details

I have been using Open Water daily for the past four years and will continue to do so.

The judging process is a great feature, allowing us to involve over 80+ experts who review more than 1,800 session proposals. This process lets us organize submissions by program categories and gives us the flexibility to choose, for instance, how many judges will review each proposal. Sessions can be assigned randomly at first, and then easily moved between judges as needed, ensuring that the right expert evaluates each proposal.

One of my favorite aspects of Open Water is its learning curve. The platform offers an excellent balance between responsive customer support and comprehensive resources for self-learning. This approach has enabled us to implement new features each year that improve our workflow and make the system even easier to use. I now only contact customer support when I encounter a significant issue, and their responses are always prompt and direct me to helpful resources. On this point, ease of of implementation is guaranteed.

In terms of value (money), Open Water is very flexible. It allows you to manage multiple programs at once and does not charge per application or participant, which adds to its versatility. While OW is often used for grant or scholarship management, we use it to collect session proposals for a conference focused on technology and human rights. The overall process is quite similar, and we collaborate with OW to refine our evaluation process to fit our needs.

Ease of integration is also great. You can use the integration's hub but this is an extra paid feature. We have used it and it is positive. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

Open Water could improve its dashboard features, as it can sometimes be difficult to easily view all the key data points for your program. For instance, seeing how many sessions have been submitted, completed, or are still in process is not always straightforward. However, this issue is limited to the dashboard, since OpenWater does offer strong reporting capabilities. It would also be helpful if a summary of the main data points from your program appeared directly on the main program page. As for the interface, it may have looked outdated until recently, but they are currently working on a redesign, which I am very much looking forward to. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

I used to collect our scholarship applications by paper copies that were mailed in, and then I had to scan everything in. After that I had to save applications for our judges to access and they had to fill out paper forms. OpenWater has saved our team hundreds of hours; our scholarships look cleaner than they did before and we can make sure applicants are supplying the information we need with the required fields! Applications often came in with missing information, which disqualified them. Collecting the information for payment has also been made a breeze! Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

One of the downsides to the platform is where some of the items are located; there are several spots for judge information or what limitations you want to have on your application. With having multiple locations for different things, it takes a little longer to set things up. I absolutely love the customer service in terms of how quickly they respond and assist with any questions- when they go on vacation there is always someone else to help. But some of the things that I have felt should be intuitive are not, which results in me reaching out and having to get assistance when it could have been right there. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

There are many things I like about OpenWater. Before using OpenWater, our organization did everything via email. When you have 400 or more students and businesses applying via email, that gets very overwhelming and becomes inefficient. OpenWater has allowed our organization to streamline every one of our programs and application processes. Not only that, but creating the applications and procedures on OpenWater is clear, straightforward, and efficient. On the user side, we've been told that the software is easy to navigate. Lastly, the customer support has been stellar! Once we began using OpenWater, we've worked exclusively with the Director of Customer Support, and she's been amazing! She answers every question or concern I have. It's felt very much like a collaborative process as my coworkers and I learn to use the platform. OpenWater has gone above and beyond for our organization. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

I have yet to find a downside of using OpenWater. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

Great customer service and quick response times. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

We've experienced several "bugs" (more than we think is acceptable) as well as other not so great standard features that have affected our own processes as well as our applicants'/reviewers' experiences. (For example, in the review form, when going to the second page, it does not take the user to the top of the form, it starts them in the middle. We've been told that this is just the way it is... But we keep getting complaints about it because it makes our reviewers' jobs harder.) This is just one example of a standard feature that we are not happy with. The amount of bugs we have experienced has also been frustrating.

The overall look and feel / user experience of the software could also be improved. (Just looks outdated and is not always very user friendly). I know you are working on updating this, so we are hopeful it will improve soon.

Also, this is probably our biggest issue, but only one person can own and fill out a form— others can't log in to complete their own sections. We wish it were possible for multiple people to enter their individual information into a shared form, with everything connecting to the same place. I know you said you were working on adding this too, so we are holding out hope! Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

We have been using OpenWater for 5-6 years now to assist with our Emerald Awards program. It has significantly streamlined not only the back end process, but the front end for our members. We had to do some custom development to make the system work like we wanted but the development team was great. Because we're only in the system 1x per year, it's hard to remember all the necessary steps and their customer service is fantastic. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

There is some functionality that didn't work as we hoped so we did need to spend some additional money for custom development. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

The application is pretty easy to navigate. The reports and export function save a lot of time. When I do need help, the support team is so responsive. Really appreciate the care and consideration that the team at OpenWater takes to answer questions and when necessary, address issues. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

I don't have anything to mention for OpenWater. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

Open Water has enbaled us to adhere to it's process in defining an application, and using that application to create an online portal for which interested partis can interact with application over a period of time, and submit a final application within the deadline for that calendar year. THis software allowed us to automate this process for whioch was one a very manual, paper-based process. This process starts with the application setup, and then bringing in the invited nominated companies, bring forward their application submissions, and move us through the judging stage. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

We use Open Water for most of this process. However, we tend not to use the built-in email functions as the email tends to fall into "spam" mailboxes, and is no longer effective for us. We email our nominated parties separate from Open Water. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

I was not familiar with the workings of the application website, but the help page came in handy when it was time to make updates and changes as the year progressed. I still refer to the help page when I need a refresher on how everything works or how to adjust some things so that is what I like best, having simple instructions and easy to follow steps. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

Although our office workflow has greatly improved with the OpenWater Application, I do find some things not available to us or have not found a work around to every issue but overall, the whole process has been an improvement for our program so far. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

The OpenWater team has an impressive response rate (they are quick) and their customer service is beyond compare. Any time I've needed assistance, our dedicated team member has answered my questions fully, taken initiative to find us better solutions, and assists in customizing our experience and use of their platform as we go. After being in the system every day most months of the year, I can say that it does take time to learn - but the OpenWater customer service team gives you every bit of help in implementing your programs and each step of the way. The platform is already nearly-infinitely customizable, and if needed, they have a team of brilliant programmers who will create a solution specifically for your program. For example, they built a solution for our complex scoring system in a way that reduced our workload significantly. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

I think the only thing I cold point to as a negative is the time to familiarize yourself with the system. It means having a dedicated, tech-savvy person in charge is imperative. That said, I haven't looked into OW's learning programs as much as I should for our other team members - I usually train them on the specifics of what I need them to do in the system. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

The ease of use and customer support. I can always count on the support team to respond is a very timely manner. The number of features that are available is a top benefit for us. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

There is a learning curve to Open Water, but once you learn the system, the possibilities are endless. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.