Staff Paging, Staff Chat and My Assignments

Last updated October 2026  ·  5 min read

A loud venue is a bad place to find your judges. Taikai App gives you three tools to reach your crew on event day:

• Notices: a push to the phones of the judges and staff you pick, who answer "Coming" or "Can't".
• Staff chat: one channel for the whole crew plus direct messages, on the web and in the Taikai app.
• My Assignments: a screen in the Taikai app where every judge and staff member sees their tatami, chair and times.

All three work with the people you approved as judges and staff for your tournament (see Creating and assigning staff roles).

Paging judges and staff

The Officials and Staff sections of the Tournament Manager have a bar at the top with Send notice and Staff chat.

• 1
  Click Send notice A small window opens.
• 2
  Choose who gets it All judges & staff, Judges only, Staff only, Judges on a tatami you pick (the judges seated there today), or Specific people picked by name.
• 3
  Write the message and click Send Tap a quick message such as "Please come to the control table", "Go to your tatami now", "Judges meeting in 10 minutes" or "Break is over", or type your own (up to 280 characters).

The notice arrives as a push notification in the Taikai app, as a browser notification where they allowed it, and in their notification list. The bar then shows your three most recent notices with how many are coming, how many can't and how many haven't answered. Click a notice to see the names in each group.

Answering a notice

• In the Taikai app, tapping the notification (or the notice in the Alerts tab) opens it with two big buttons: Coming and Can't. They can change their answer later.
• On the web, unanswered notices from the last 12 hours appear at the top of their account dashboard with I'm coming and Can't.

Staff chat

Staff chat is a private conversation space for the tournament's organizers, judges and staff. It has:

• The Staff channel, which everyone on the crew can read and write.
• Direct messages between two people. Use New message to start one.

Where to open it:

• Directors: the Staff chat button in the Officials or Staff section. It opens as a side panel, so you can keep working.
• Judges and staff on the web: the Staff chat button on their role card in their account dashboard.
• In the Taikai app: the Staff chat card on the Today screen, shown to approved judges and staff.

New messages appear within a few seconds, with unread counts per conversation. The app sends a push notification for new messages, at most one per conversation per minute, and tapping it opens the conversation.

Anyone can Report a message or Block a person (in the app, long-press the message). Reports go to the tournament director. Blocking hides that person's messages from you.

My Assignments in the app

Judges and staff open My Assignments from the Today screen or My Events in the Taikai app. It has two tabs:

• Mine: each seat with its tatami, chair, day and time window (with how long it lasts), plus any Other duties you added to their card in the Officials or Staff section. Each seat shows whether they are assigned, seated or done.
• Panel: the whole judging roster, so judges can see where colleagues sit and for how long.

If someone is approved but not seated yet, the screen says they are waiting for their assignment and updates by itself once you place them. Seats come from Mat Assignments in the Officials section (see Running multiple tatamis). On the web, judges see the same seats on the judge device.

Who can do what

Turn permissions on per person in the Staff section (see Available permissions explained).