Cascading messages are a powerful cross-team communication tool in Ninety that allows you to send important information from one team to other teams in your organization. These messages help ensure critical decisions, updates, and announcements reach the right teams efficiently. 

Plan Requirements

Sharing Headlines with other teams or the whole organization is a feature available for companies on the Accelerate or Thrive subscription plans.

If Cascading Messages appear grayed out, contact your admin about upgrading your plan.

Who Can Send Cascading Messages?

Any licensed user in Ninety can send cascading messages to any team, including teams they are not part of. You don't need special permissions or team membership to send cascading messages to other teams. This ensures that anyone can facilitate cross-team communication when needed.

Important limitation: You cannot send a Cascading Message to the team you are currently working in. This is by design — if you need to share information within your own team, create an Issue or Headline instead.

How to Create and Send Cascading Messages

To create a new message to cascade to one or more teams in your organization.

1. Click Headlines from the left navigation.
2. Choose the intended team from the Team dropdown.
3. Click Create Cascading Message toward the bottom of the page.
4. Write a title and description for the message.
5. Click the down arrow or anywhere on the Team field to select the team or teams you want to send the message to.
6. Click the Create Cascading Message. 

Cascaded messages, like Headlines, are read during meetings.

Selecting Teams for Your Message

When creating Cascading Messages, you have several options:

• Select specific teams: Choose individual teams from the dropdown list.
• Select "All": Sends to all teams except your current team.
• Multiple team selection: You can send to multiple specific teams at once.

Note: The teams available in your dropdown depend on your user role and company plan. Some users may not see all teams in the organization.

Where Do Recipients See Cascading Messages?

Cascading messages appear in the Headlines section of the receiving teams' dashboards. Team members will see these messages when they:

• Access their team's Headlines tool
• Review Headlines during their meetings
• Check their team's archived messages

How to Cascade (Send) a Headline to Other Teams

To cascade (send) a current Headline to another team or multiple teams.

1. Click Headlines from the left navigation.
2. Choose the intended team from the Team dropdown.
3. Right-click the Headline.
4. Click Cascade.
5. Edit the Headline's title or description as desired.
6. Click the down arrow to choose the team (or teams) to send the Headline to.
7. Click Create Cascading Message.

Viewing Messages You've Sent

This is a key limitation: You cannot easily view cascading messages you've sent to other teams unless you are a member of those teams.

Workaround: If you need to track messages you've sent, consider:

• Taking screenshots before sending
• Using Issues for communication that requires follow-up tracking

Troubleshooting Common Issues

Click through the tabs below to review common issues with Cascaded Messages.

Best Practices for Cascading Messages

When to Use Cascading Messages

• Company-wide announcements
• Cross-departmental updates
• Sharing decisions that impact multiple teams
• Communicating policy changes
• Celebrating achievements across teams

When NOT to Use Cascading Messages

• Internal team discussions (use Issues instead)
• Requests requiring responses or tracking (use Issues to other teams)
• Sensitive information requiring confirmation of receipt
• Messages requiring ongoing conversation or follow-up

Communication Best Practices

• Keep messages clear and concise
• Include all necessary context since recipients can't ask follow-up questions easily
• Consider using multiple communication channels for critical messages
• For urgent matters, supplement with direct communication (email, phone, Slack)

Differences Between Cascading Messages and Headlines

Headlines are for your own team and appear in your team's Headlines section during meetings.

Cascading Messages are sent to other teams and appear in their Headlines sections.