AI Assistant
The Applaud AI Assistant for HR now helps HR managers save time by utilizing AI to automate the completion of employee forms. This means less manual data entry, faster access to HR information, and smoother employee self-service experiences with AI-powered HR software.
Complete forms using the AI Assistant
Employees can now use the AI Assistant to complete forms through conversation, eliminating the need to search for the form or fill it out manually. This update provides seamless support for your employees' everyday needs, including booking leave and raising a case.
- Conversational form completion: The Assistant guides users through the process of gathering the required information and submitting the form in a step-by-step manner.
- Form logic awareness: It checks required fields, hidden values, and dependencies just like the front-end form would.
- Live confirmation before submission: Users receive a summary of the completed form before submitting it, ensuring accuracy and completeness.
- Built-in access control: Only users with permission to access the page can use the form through AI.
- Support for translated and migrated forms: The Assistant works with forms set up using templates and across multiple languages.
See our knowledge base article, Complete tasks using the AI Assistant.
Knowledge Management
Applaud's Knowledge Management tools now give HR teams more ways to create and share resources. You can add links between HR knowledge base articles directly while editing, and upload videos to HR knowledge articles to make content more engaging and easier to follow. These updates make your HR knowledge base clearer, more connected, and more useful for employees.
Link to other knowledge articles
You can now add links to other knowledge articles directly in the body of an article using the rich text editor.
This update makes it easier to guide your employees to the correct information by embedding contextual links inside your content. For example, you can reference setup steps from another guide or point to related policies, all without relying on sidebar navigation or separate resources.
Select some text, like the article title, and then select the document icon. Alternatively, type the @ symbol. Search for your Knowledge article and select it from the list. This creates a link chip to your selected article. When published, each link appears as an interactive chip that opens the article in the same view.
If the linked article is moved or deleted, the chip shows an error message and highlights the issue.
By linking to other articles contextually, you help employees stay on track, reduce dead ends, and make your help content feel more connected and human. See our knowledge base article, About the rich text block.
Upload video files to the file property
To make it easier for you to add multimedia to articles supporting training and how-to guides, we've enhanced the article attachment feature, allowing you to now upload videos up to 20MB.
The supported video formats include:
- MP4
- OGV
- OGM
- WebM
- MOV
- MKV
This update allows you to embed videos directly into your content, eliminating the need for external hosting platforms or workarounds. Whether you're sharing internal training, how-to guides, or video updates, this enhancement makes your content more engaging and easier to manage with minimal effort. For more information about the upload field, refer to our knowledge base article, 'Edit field - upload'.
Cleaner, simpler WYSIWYG toolbar
We've given the article editor a refresh. The toolbar is now easier to use, with fewer icons and smarter groupings. You'll still find all the same formatting options, just more tidily arranged.
Here's what's changed:
Additional formatting groups
Text formatting, such as superscript, subscript, strikethrough, and clear formatting, is grouped. Layout tools, including alignment and indentation, are also grouped.
Bullet group
Bulleted and numbered lists are now in one place.
Insert the elements group
Add quotes, tables, and code blocks.
Some rarely used icons have been removed or combined to save space. These updates streamline writing and formatting articles, especially for editors working in a limited screen space. These are also available when sending a new message through HR Case Management. If you're still using the old editor version, you can switch to the newer version. See our knowledge base article, Switch to a better Rich Text Editor experience.
Use AI to create knowledge articles from uploaded documents instantly
You can now upload a policy document to generate a draft knowledge article in seconds. This enhancement utilizes AI to rewrite and structure the uploaded content into an article format of your choice, such as FAQ, How-to, or Overview, without requiring a complete rewrite from scratch.
After uploading your document:
- The system automatically converts it and pre-fills an article draft based on the chosen format.
- You can review and edit the draft as needed before publishing.
- Re-uploading the document lets you regenerate the article if the policy changes later.
This feature helps you save time, maintain consistency with official policies, and reduce manual effort when publishing structured content.
Creator Platform
The Applaud Creator Platform for HR automation provides you with more flexibility to design and control processes without requiring coding. You can now generate HR content with AI, create HR workflows that retrieve multiple records, and add restrictions to HR workflow triggers to prevent loops. These updates enable HR managers to build smarter, safer, and more efficient HR processes using a no-code HR workflow builder.
Generate text based on your content
You can now create smarter, more tailored content by dynamically pulling in real-time knowledge or document content to enrich your AI-generated messages using the Generate Text workflow action.
We've improved workflows by allowing the AI Generate Text action to search content from your existing knowledge base or documents. This enables the AI to reference content within your platform, resulting in more relevant and accurate messages.
For example, when creating a welcome message for new employees or periodic company-wide announcements, you can set your AI-generated text to reference the latest information updated by your HR team. This keeps your information in one central location, so you only need to update it in a single place.
We've added a new Global search option to the Retrieve Information workflow action. You can still select which models this is restricted to, for example, Knowledge or Documents, and the relevant properties. You can also ensure that this is run as a specific user, for example, the triggering user ensures the right permissions are used for each user.
We've made the Retrieved Information available when using the new Global search option available in the Generate Text workflow action, so you can use it in the prompt when creating messages from AI. You can also include the retrieved record count in your prompt and other workflow actions, like conditions or If/Then branches, to make decisions based on the number of results found.
This upgrade makes the content more relevant to the context and facilitates automated content creation across various applications.
Enhanced multiple records handling in workflows
You can now create a condition that branches your workflow based on the number of records retrieved in a previous step. For example, you can check if there are any knowledge articles in a category, and if none exist, send a notification to the Knowledge Manager to create one.
Retrieve multiple records
In your workflow, add a 'Retrieve information' workflow action and select the 'Retrieve multiple records' option instead of fetching a single record.
Token: "retrievedRecordsCount"
When you enable multiple record retrieval, the system provides a new token: "retrievedRecordsCount." You can use this token in If/Then conditions to branch logic based on the number of records retrieved. Use the number of retrieved records in If/Then conditions for smarter branching logic.
If/Then workflow action
You can now use retrievedRecordsCount to make comparisons, such as greater than or less than, directly in your workflow branches. When setting up an If/Then action, choose the retrievedRecordsCount token to create conditions based on the number of records retrieved earlier. For example, you can check if the count is greater than zero to run specific actions only when records are found. This allows you to easily control your workflow based on the number of records returned, making your process more innovative and more efficient.
Restriction Option on Trigger to Prevent Loops
We've added a new Restrict other workflow triggers option to help you prevent infinite loops and unnecessary workflow executions.
When you select this option in a workflow's trigger settings, the workflow will not trigger any other workflows, except date-based workflows, which continue to run as expected. This gives you better control and avoids repetitive triggers that can cause loop errors.
Previously, if Workflow A updated data that triggered Workflow B, and Workflow B updated data that triggered Workflow A again, the result was an infinite loop. This update ensures that workflows run only when needed, improving system stability and performance. Read more about avoiding workflow loops in our knowledge base article, Avoiding Workflow Infinite Loops.
Cleaner, More Informative Notifications
We've improved system notifications to make them more personal and easier to read:
- First Name Only: All user-facing notifications (email, in-app, Slack, etc.) now display only the user's first Name instead of their full Name.
- Inline Case Updates: Notifications for case updates now include the latest change directly in the message, so you no longer need to click through to view the update.
This change reduces clutter, improves readability, and provides quick access to essential information without requiring extra steps. See our knowledge base article, About notifications.