Because it's what the users want...

Or perhaps,

If we change it, then the user's will stop using it!

I know I am not alone in my innate skepticism to general statements such as these.  But how do you know what the users want?  More importantly, how can someone make the argument that users will stop using it? These are great questions, where the answers in the Web 1.0 mentality are as ethereal as time travel.  A proverbial stalemate in most case, resulting in most people choosing not to ask! 

This is where I see a great opportunity for the Clearspace(X) platform.  With its bevvy of features, including Polling, Forums, Reporting, and OpenFire Presence Integrations, I see the gap between the answers to questions like these closing rapidly.  Let's take a look at how I would propose the use of ClearspaceX and an established community to address these situations.

Proposed Case

Company ABC has an interactive user application XYZ.  Non-company  users use the ABC daily, posting information that has grown to be critical for company ABC efficiencies.  However, the company is evaluating a need to update the interface/functionality for XYZ.  In a meeting where solutions are pitched, a suggestion is made that will make XYZ more robust in the long-haul; however, as a trade-off, some of XYZ's existing functionality will need to be accessed differently, behaviorally changed, and/or lost all together.  After the dust settles, the aforementioned suggestion holds the best long-term strategies at heart; however, it is constrained by the above tactical constraints.  How do we proceed?

(assumption, statistically relevent sample of the user's of XYZ  are reachable via an Online Community. Kind of a Catch-22, but provides reasoning on why a community platform investment is valueable)

Step #1 - Polling

In the community, we would post some high-level Polls to gauge initial feedback. Variations of the question could resemble something of this nature: 

Which of the following features listed , do you feel is the most important?The answer set should include all features impacted by the recommended change, unless the list is long, in which case I would break the Poll into multiple Polls spanned over an appropriate time range.  In each of these Polls, it is important to provide an option similar to, "None of the Features are important to me". Assuming we receive a large enough sample, we can immediately add some credence to the argument that the highly nominated features are in-fact relevant to a certain degree.  An optional last poll could be taken to run the top most selected features from each poll together, to see their rank against each other.

At this point, we may or may not have additional steps.  Assuming that a large percentage of people did not select the "None of the Features are important to me"...we can now go to the next step.

Step #2 - Targetted Forums

Now that you have some direction where there MAY be some friction, using the Forums element, post some questions to the community, suggesting the necessary changes to the features.  Be up front about the impact, this is important.  If the feature will not be there, dont sugar coat.  A simple table presentation or easily digestable format is recommended.  You can choose to possibly only include your top-ranked poll selections if desired.  It will reduce the noise of the discussion thread most certainly; however, you risk losing an opportunity to get candid viral feedback about these features.  If any doubt, error on the side of inclusion!

Assuming we get a similar turnout for feedback, we can evaluate specific elements of a feature that are desired and focus on possibly achieving that vs. the entire feature altogether.  At this point, we should feel fairly confident in our understanding of these features, and their impact on application XYZ!

Note:  In most communities you have "star performers" that represent above-average participation in the community.  Be sure to take their feedback into consideration as a tie-breaker when in doubt.

Step #3 - Real-Time Interaction

If further clarity is stil needed, you can advertise an online chat, using the OpenFire Chat Integration in ClearspaceX.  Invite the target audience of participatns from the polls and forums, along with the rest of the community.  In this chat, I would be even more candid about why you are on the fence.  Ask direct questions to community, and open the floor for discussion.  Discussions in real-time tend to draw out more debate as they tend to favor hot instinctive discussion, as opposed to cold predicated thought.

Each one of these steps can be repeated in any order at this point to achieve the desired level of comfort, but at the end of the day.   You have tangible/quantifiable facts that represent the user-base, and can depend less on abstractions / interpretations of off-topic indirect feedback possibly related to the feature(s).

Summation

For companies that are highly dependent on satisfying a large distributed set of end-users, a community presence makes perfect business sense.  Not only can you argue the traditional "self-service" argument as users help each other, but an established community platform provides a sounding board for the business to create quick and statistically relevant analysis for litmus testing ideas in the incubation stage.  This will help to insure that ideas with solid business models with complementing solid understandings of the user receptiveness to said ideas are put at the forefront of development.   In the new era of Web 2.0, where agility is king, the concept of a community presence is an invaluable ally in building brand loyality with an ever-growing and demanding marketplace.

If you have similar experiences and/or feedback regarding the above process, I would love to hear it.  Especiially regarding how receptive communities are to cooperative changes to a community, in the face of losing features, as long as they are part of the process and the change is for the greater good.