We’re excited to provide another BE industry 1st solution! No more spreadsheets!
Instead of having to respond to a million questions, all in slightly different formats – now you can answer these questions ONCE! Our team (and our partners) are messaging to all owners and design firms to use this centralized resource so it’s only a matter of time until everyone know!
If you get a question (or spreadsheet) from someone who doesn’t yet know about this resource, you can send them here! Especially if you have already answered the question! Or you can add their question and answer it here and then send them back here!
As of 6/9/25 version 1 is live and we will be improving it based on your feedback!
NOTE: Any manufacturer who is using our Data Services – and we have already ingested your product data- you won’t have to fill this out! Your data would automatically fill out based on the certifications your products have! For startups or small companies whose product certifications are in process, you can fill this out and indicate that they are coming. Even if you are filling this out – you only do that once!
The digitized Q+A works in one of two ways. You can either fill out the entire CMF Questionnaire on your own, without being asked or you can wait until a designer asks you to and respond to whichever questions are asked. You don’t have to fill out anything if you use our Data Services, since that lets us automate this function!
For a quick How-To video showing how to do this, click here!
If you want to fill out all (or some) of the CMF questionnaire, first click on the Designer Q+A in the side pane of your dashboard and then click on one of the blue buttons to start filling out your information.
Remember, you are ONLY filling this out if we are not managing your data (which automates the answers) – or if you want us to manage your data, but it will take some time to make that happen – you can fill this out now and then we’ll automate any updates or changes in the future.
Getting Started
To take the first step towards an easier life – sign in to your account and you’ll see:
- (1) Indicator: When you log in, you can easily see if designers have sent you any questions! (these may be general questions OR CMF-specific).
- (2) Q+A’s: Your side pane shows you the General Q+A and the sustainability/CMF Q+A separately, so you can focus on what you want to respond to first, or different people can respond to each type (you might have a Rep answer general questions, but inside Sustainability staff answer CMF questions).
- (3) Community Tile: You can either click on this tile OR on the side pane Q+A’s (as in #2 above) to get to the questions page. Note, the Community Tile takes you straight to the CMF questions but you can easily swap over.
Responding to Questions
There are two options. Either you can proactively fill out the CMF Questionnaires about your products (or use our data services so that it’s completely automated!) OR you can wait for a designer to initiate and ask you questions and then you can respond. First, we’ll show you how to respond and in the next section, we’ll show you how to proactively fill out questionnaires.
Once you click on the Community Tile or the CMF Q+A in the side pane, you will see something like the first image below, which is the Summary view of all CMF Questionnaires (either the ones you filled out or ones initiated by designers). There may be one or many. The second image shows you the General Q+A Summary View.
- (4) Switch Between Q+A Options: You can easily swap back and forth between General and CMF by clicking the top button. When you are in CMF view, that button will say, “Q+A” and when you are in General view, it will say, “CMF Questionnaires”.
- (5) Side Pane: or you can do this by clicking on the side pane options in either view.
To answer a question or see a comment, just click on the item in the summary view. Note, as we gather feedback from this beta version, we will streamline this so there are fewer steps!
- (6) Sort Items by Type: If there is a long list of items or questions, you can sort them by different ‘scales’ or types, whether the question refers to a Line/Collection, an Individual Product or a Product Component (such as a chair back).
- (7) Click on item “tile”: Click anywhere on the tile in Summary view that you want to open.
- (8) Click on Question Icon: Once you open that item, you will see the Question indicator appear on all rows where designers have asked questions. Open each “bucket” to make sure you see them all. As shown above in far right, the indicator will say “1 Question” or “2 Questions” (depending on how many there are). You’ll click on that question icon to open and see more detail.
Once you click on the Question Icon, you’ll see all the detail of the question or comment. This includes any “UpVotes” that designers add, indicating how important that question is to multiple people. Now designers can just UpVote instead of sending you the same questions multiple times, but you can still see how important it is and what the demand is!
- (9) Click on the item: Click anywhere on the tile to open up the detail
- (10) UpVotes Show Demand: Here you see how many people “UpVoted” this question or comment (there is a view that shows you firm names and the number from each firm).
- (11) Response Text Box: This is where you can respond to the question or comment asked and you can also ask clarifying questions. In the example above, the designer said that the current disclosure at 1,000 ppm doesn’t meet their firm’s requirements for insulation and asks if you plan on disclosing at that level any time soon. The reply might indicate that you’ll check, but that you also want to clarify if that needs to apply to both interior and exterior applications (and if it varies by project type). Once asked and answered – ALL designers who care about this question can see it and not have to ask you again!
Proactively Fill Out CMF Questionnaires
If you want to get ahead of the designers and fill out CMF Questionnaires to show them how your products comply with CMF factors, you have two options. The first is no work. If you want to make life easy by having us curate and manage your data – all assessments happen automatically. This includes CMF, a design firm’s standards or requirements, building rating systems (email [email protected] to get the most recent details about all the benefits of our data services – the lowest cost/highest value in the industry!).
If you are not having BE manage your data – we still make it EASY! Instead of responding to a million spreadsheets – you can use our convenient drop down menu forms to answer questions once! After you log in, you will see this screen, indicating that you have no questionnaires filled out yet.
(12) Click to Start: click either button to start your first CMF assessment! (Note – the # 1 that appears in the upper left of this image indicates, in this case, that you have General questions already being asked – and those appear in the “Designer Q+A” window, when you click that term in the left navigation pane).
Next, decide which scope of product you want to address:
- a Line or Collection: containing different products with the same attributes
- a Specific Product: that has certifications for that product in its entirety
- a Component of a Product: For example, a chair may have a seat, arms, legs or other parts with different attributes that you might want to address separately.
- (13) Progress Bar: This shows you how many steps there are and how far you’ve gotten
- (14) Select Type: Choose the type of item you will be focusing on
- (15) Reset / Next: At each step, you can change your mind and click “Reset Form” to cancel what you’ve done or “Next” to move to the next step.
Next you provide the name of the product (or line/collection/component) that this CMF questionnaire will apply to (very soon, you will just be able to click on the product or certification in our catalog if you choose).
(16) Type the name in the text box: Note, if what you are focusing on addresses multiple lines/collections, products or components, click the “Add Another” button and list all of those that share the SAME information. The answers you will be giving must apply to every item you list EXACTLY.
Then, you indicate what evidence you have from certification data related to the CMF Buckets. If we don’t have your product data (so that this process isn’t automated yet for you), just click on the drop downs for each question to indicate what answers apply to your question. Below you see that for Transparency, you can choose what level of disclosure is true for the product you indicated previously. Then continue the same way for all 5 buckets. You will be able to upload any certification PDFs you want afterwards.
(17) Select the right data: Each item has a drop down menu. Simply click the correct one and you’re done! You do this ONCE and then designers come here to check the answer instead of sending you a spreadsheet! Then they can UpVote to show you they care.
Below are the summary views of the other 4 CMF Buckets (in addition to Human Health above) developed by mindful MATERIALS and its community of design leaders:
The last step is to upload any PDF documents to support your answers. You can upload as many as you need.
Remember, currently when you upload certifications or other documentation to support your CMF assessment (because you are not using our Data Services to automate) those documents are only visible here, in the context of the CMF Questions. Those documents are not “actionable” in the workflow part of the platform where designers are creating Master Material Lists (outline specs) or Project Material Lists.
Now you’re done! When you hit “Submit” you get to the Summary view as shown below. This is where a complete list of CMF Questionnaires (assessments) will be found when they have been filled out.
- (20) Summary: This shows one Questionnaire filled out with a high-level view of which CMF “Buckets” have information. On the designer’s side, they can click on this and see your answers and ask questions. Designers CAN ask questions about buckets that have no information, even if you didn’t fill out anything! That way you know what they care about (relative to items without data).
- (19) Last Chance: You still have the opportunity to edit your questionnaire or delete it if you need to.
- (18) Next Product: Once you’ve completed your first questionnaire, you can move on to the next one by clicking “New Report Card”
