Limiting scheduling to building schedulers

In our Stake we have building schedulers schedule all uses of the buildings and rooms to avoid someone booking the building or rooms inappropriately (Like just because they can, a calendar editor taking all of the Saturday afternoons in a building without regard to other needs) . We have asked the Bishops to let the calendar editors know that they need to continue to still use our building schedulers, but as calendar editors discover that they can make a reservation for a building/room they are venturing out and doing it. Then when the building scheduler tries to reserve the room for a authorized event, there is a conflict. Then the calendar editor that thought they had the rooms scheduled has to be told that they don't and we are having issues.

Is the only way to make this not happen, but still use the online new LDS calendars, to have the building schedulers block off all days of the year so that they are the only ones that can add something?

Surely there are other Stakes that don't want every editor "grabbing" rooms, but using an orderly calendar with building schedulers. Can we have a option to say that Building schedulers are the only ones authorized to reserve buildings/rooms etc.?

Please help!

ebastow wrote:In our Stake we have building schedulers schedule all uses of the buildings and rooms to avoid someone booking the building or rooms inappropriately (Like just because they can, a calendar editor taking all of the Saturday afternoons in a building without regard to other needs) . We have asked the Bishops to let the calendar editors know that they need to continue to still use our building schedulers, but as calendar editors discover that they can make a reservation for a building/room they are venturing out and doing it. Then when the building scheduler tries to reserve the room for a authorized event, there is a conflict. Then the calendar editor that thought they had the rooms scheduled has to be told that they don't and we are having issues.

I don't understand why there are any calendar editors at all, if your stake has the philosophy that only building schedulers can schedule the buildings. If that is indeed your stake's philosophy, then I would think that your stake president would instruct the bishops to have all calendar editors removed from the system. You can't remove default administrators, but those are just the bishopric, clerks, executive secretary, and website administrator, so that is a small set of people who should be responsive to direction from the bishop and stake president.

ebastow wrote:Surely there are other Stakes that don't want every editor "grabbing" rooms, but using an orderly calendar with building schedulers.

There are indeed other stakes who have a hard time accepting the distributed scheduling model. You can search the forums and find others who prefer to do scheduling the old centralized way. One thread that discusses this is: Distributed Scheduling vs Centralized Scheduling for Calendars.

ebastow wrote:Can we have a option to say that Building schedulers are the only ones authorized to reserve buildings/rooms etc.?

Is the only way to make this not happen, but still use the online new LDS calendars, to have the building schedulers block off all days of the year so that they are the only ones that can add something?

There is an option to set each day for each location to be "Blocked", which means that only building schedulers can put events on the calendar. It's easily done (it can be done in less than a minute for the whole year). You just go into Settings > Reservations, set up a repeating reservation that repeats daily, starting on 1 Jan and ending on 31 Dec (or whatever range you want up to 2 years, and set the unit as "Blocked". That should give you what you want in terms of control.

I would note, however, that many stakes are successfully using the distributed model (including my stake). It requires some training, and some adjustments in the way people think about scheduling, but it is a very effective model once you make the switch. We never have any cases that could be described as "every editor grabbing rooms" -- before we switched, some people had fears that that would happen, but it has never been a problem. It's truly a situation where you teach correct principles and let them govern themselves.

Thanks for the response. I will work with our Stake Presidency and see if we are brave enough to move to the new distributed model.

+1 for what aebrown stated.

There is so much of the calendar capabilities that are lost when a single point of scheduling is used. And it makes it way too difficult and excruciatingly time consuming to schedule a simple event.

If the scenario described in post #1 is the primary rationalization for such stringent controls on scheduling then train the administrators and editors. Have a little faith and trust. How do you teach children to share? Do you take away all the toys and make them come to one adult each time they want a toy? Or do you teach them the principle of sharing and step in only to mediate conflicts? If an editor abuses the rights they have then train them. If the training doesn't work then remove them as an editor.

Another solution to conflict prevention is to use resource reservations rather than blocking. If one ward is scheduling events with resources at a location and time that should be set aside for a particular unit then reserve the resources to prevent that from happening. See the "Making Reservations" section of the calendar helpfor further information.

Not everyone needs to be an editor. Train administrators to carefully consider each calendar submitted and the editors for each calendar to ensure only what calendars are needed are created and only those responsible and necessary as editors are added. A diligent website administrator could review the calendars and editors for those calendars periodically to ensure this happens.

Thanks for the insight and rationale. We jumped from the classic resource calendar with the building schedulers approving reservations to this new model and it just seemed like the "wild, wild west" since so many default calendar editors were created by default in each Ward.

But now that I've reviewed the roles and etc. I can see the new expanded role of a Stake/Ward Administrator and having them work with the Calendar Editors and training them, then this should work great.

I've downloaded all of the Calendar 2.0 guides and we will use them to train with.

Any other ways that you have successfully got your Stake/Ward's trained?

ebastow wrote:Any other ways that you have successfully got your Stake/Ward's trained?

We have found it to be very helpful to have one person in each ward designated as the Calendar Coordinator. It is one of the Ward Calendar Administrators who takes on some important roles:

• Primary point of contact for building schedulers and stake administrators for calendar issues
• Approver of calendars submitted by ward members for approval. This also includes maintaining a good strategy for how many calendars the ward has to deal with, balancing flexibility and simplicity
• Trainer of all other calendar editors and other calendar users in the ward
• Scheduler of events that need to be on the calendar but don't fall in the realm of any other calendar editor. This includes private events (wedding receptions, etc.) but also miscellaneous activities that come up from time to time that don't fit in the normal process.

The coordinator might be a bishopric member, a clerk, an executive secretary, or a website administrator -- and in our stake we have at least one ward coordinator in each of those callings.

There is also a stake coordinator with similar roles at the stake level, as well as additional responsibilities for working with and training building schedulers and ward coordinators.

When these calendar coordinators are functioning well, the building scheduler's life is pretty easy. And the calendar coordinators have full access to all the ward's public calendars, so they are in a better position to add events than the building scheduler could be.

In the HELP section on the website, I read: "Administrators can see the editors and viewers for the calendar. But to view, add, or manage the events on the calendar, administrators must be added as an editor or viewer. This security restriction ensures the privacy of the calendar."

I am a stake center building scheduler where two wards meet. When I view the calendar, either in week view or month view, I see only the reservation (ward & time) with no details. In v1 of the calendar, each reservation scheduled had detailed info so I could know what ward, resource, time etc the building would be in use. In v2, though all the reservations did convert over, I cannot see details as I previously did, only basic info that I am thinking is what a 'member' will see. I can edit reservations but not see details. Could this mean I am not set up properly in our system as stated above? OR is this a bug?

lesleyann wrote:In v2, though all the reservations did convert over, I cannot see details as I previously did, only basic info that I am thinking is what a 'member' will see. I can edit reservations but not see details. Could this mean I am not set up properly in our system as stated above? OR is this a bug?

It sounds to me like you are seeing the details. If you can edit a reservation, you certainly can see the details. Which specific details are you expecting to see that you are not seeing now? And when you use the word "reservation" do you really mean a reservation (under Settings > Reservations), or an event (appear on the main calendar screen, or in black on the Reservations screen)? A building scheduler has full rights over reservations in his or her building.

By 'reservations' I mean going to settings then reservations. I have had no trouble adding new reservations.

What I mean by 'details' : For example...In v1 I typed 'Kyle Stake YW camp mtg, 7pm, Nov 17.' What I now see in v2 is Kyle Stake, 7pm, Nov 17.

The trouble with this is that in v1, (example) there were 3 resources reserved for 3 different stake auxiliaries for events at 7pm on Nov 17th, and I put in the details for each; this always worked out fine. When everything showed up in v2, I have 3 events that show Kyle Stake, 7pm, Nov 17th but have no idea which auxiliaries it is reserved for or which one has what resources.

lesleyann wrote:By 'reservations' I mean going to settings then reservations. I have had no trouble adding new reservations.

What I mean by 'details' : For example...In v1 I typed 'Kyle Stake YW camp mtg, 7pm, Nov 17.' What I now see in v2 is Kyle Stake, 7pm, Nov 17.

It appears that you are using the Reservations feature for scheduling events. That's not really how the system is designed, but if for whatever reason your stake doesn't want wards to create actual events, I suppose you could make it work.

lesleyann wrote:The trouble with this is that in v1, (example) there were 3 resources reserved for 3 different stake auxiliaries for events at 7pm on Nov 17th, and I put in the details for each; this always worked out fine. When everything showed up in v2, I have 3 events that show Kyle Stake, 7pm, Nov 17th but have no idea which auxiliaries it is reserved for or which one has what resources.

Where are you looking when you say you are only seeing "Kyle Stake"? Are you in Month view or Week view? Are you reporting what you see displayed on the calendar itself? Or what you see when you hover your mouse pointer over the event? Or what you see when you click on an event, which pops up the event details?

It will be fine for wards to create events with the system set up as it is now but if I end up doing the reservation and creating an event, it will show in my stake calendar right? My understanding is that if I reserve a resource for a ward (which is how it has been and may be for some time until folks get trained) although their event is at the stake center, it does not belong on the stake calendar. ie; a ward basketball night, ward RS meeting etc.

The bigger issue for me is the detailed info that is no longer there. I see 'Kyle Stake' when I am in month view looking at the calendar itself; in week view it shows me the ward & time reserved but no resource information. When I click the pop up, it shows 'Kyle Stake' 7pm and no other details so I have no idea who or what it is reserved for. I guess what I am concerned about is the fact that I might have to re-create all the reservations to this point (our stake calendar goes from August to August) which will be many.

When wards begin creating their own events at the stake center, which calendar will they show up on?

lesleyann wrote:It will be fine for wards to create events with the system set up as it is now but if I end up doing the reservation and creating an event, it will show in my stake calendar right? My understanding is that if I reserve a resource for a ward (which is how it has been and may be for some time until folks get trained) although their event is at the stake center, it does not belong on the stake calendar. ie; a ward basketball night, ward RS meeting etc.

Yes, events you create will be on some stake calendar (there can be many). That's why it's not a good idea for a building scheduler to be adding ward events. It's much better to have someone at the ward level add the events so that they can be on an appropriate ward calendar.

lesleyann wrote:The bigger issue for me is the detailed info that is no longer there. I see 'Kyle Stake' when I am in month view looking at the calendar itself; in week view it shows me the ward & time reserved but no resource information. When I click the pop up, it shows 'Kyle Stake' 7pm and no other details so I have no idea who or what it is reserved for. I guess what I am concerned about is the fact that I might have to re-create all the reservations to this point (our stake calendar goes from August to August) which will be many.

I think some data may have been lost in the data migration to V2. There was an additional script run to update titles on reservations (see this post), but perhaps it didn't work properly in your case.

lesleyann wrote:When wards begin creating their own events at the stake center, which calendar will they show up on?

When a ward calendar editor creates an event, he or she can choose any of the calendars for which he or she is an editor. Of course, if it is a ward event, they'll want to put it on a ward calendar. But it could be any one of several ward calendars, since each ward can have multiple calendars.