As a larger organization that uses meetings to accomplish our work, our reliance on tools to make this go smoothly will only increase over time. Here at CEI we use Microsoft Outlook for scheduling meetings and reserving our conference rooms. Both the application on our systems (currently Outlook 2016) and the web version (Outlook 365 found here: https://outlook.office365.com/) are in use and fully supported. 

This page will give you some pointers to how to use Outlook for scheduling meetings, so you can focus more on the content of your meetings, and not on trying to get it scheduled. This will also help us avoid scheduling conflicts and excessive emails where we ask our colleagues when they're available for meetings.

In order to take advantage of the calendar and scheduling meetings, you will need to make sure your personal calendar is accurate and kept up-to-date. 

This includes:

• Setting your work hours (this enables you to "block off" hours before you arrive at work and after you leave -- so no one will see you as available for a 4:00 pm meeting if you regularly work 7:30 am - 4:00 pm).
• Keeping your schedule updated. Examples:
  • Work from home/teleworking days can be marked (so people will know you can only attend via Skype or conference call).
  • Adding appointments (when you have to leave the office, adding these to your calendar keeps others from trying to invite you to a meeting during that time).
  • Adding your vacation time or other days off.
  • If you need to block time on your calendar to focus on work, you can add them as appointments to ensure no one requests a meeting at that time and interrupts your flow.

We can use Outlook to schedule online, remote (Skype) meetings, or in person meetings. 

Microsoft provides support and help info with a good overview of Outlook and its basic functionality, so we won't duplicate it here, but use the links below to view their support and training pages.

• Scheduling a meeting with Outlook
• Using the Scheduling Assistant and Room Finder in Outlook -- this is great for not sending out generic emails to a bunch of people, asking when they can meet. If you use the assistant, it can show you when people don't have things on their calendars.
• Video walk-through: Creating appointments
• Outlook training

So, you've updated your Outlook schedule (so others will know when you are available and invite you to meetings at viable times instead of taking a stab in the dark). You've gone through the Microsoft articles above to become familiar with the basics of how to schedule a meeting. Now you need to apply that to our setup at CEI.

Our system isn't too complicated, but we do have meeting rooms, and have the Crestron panels outside each room that show room reservations. (NOTE: These panels have recently been upgraded and now reflect real-time changes and additions!)

Problem: People using rooms that they haven't reserved.

What often happens is that people will use a room if they believe it's open, but will not reserve it through the system. Some of this is because the Crestron panels used to only update info from Outlook only overnight (this is no longer the case with the new upgrade!). Some of this is because people have last-minute needs and just hop into a room that doesn't have anyone physically in it at the time -- and they don't add the reservation at the panel or in Outlook. If we were an office of 5 people, this might not be a concern. But as an organization of 80+ people, this can be frustrating for anyone trying to find a room to use.

Without regular use of our systems, both Outlook and Crestron panels, it can leave coworkers walking around to all the conference rooms to see if the info in Outlook is accurate. Instead of being able to find an open room by looking in Outlook at room calendars, we're stuck walking to each room that might be unoccupied, just to see if it is.

Additionally, there are times that rooms are reserved, but someone has overstayed their reserved (or unreserved) time. Often it's an oversight by the person, and they graciously apologize and vacate when they realize they've overstayed. But this is not always the case. This can lead to frustration for those using the tools that are meant to give everyone the same ability to reserve a room, and lead to more people not using the tools (because it can feel like there is little point if so many others are not). 

Solution: Use the tools available so everyone can reliably know when a room is available for use.

With the recent updates to the panels, both Outlook and the panels have current info. While you may schedule meetings without having a Conference Room calendar visible in Outlook, if you want to browse a room calendar to see what is available (before creating a meeting request), you'll want to add it in Outlook. Follow these steps to have quick access to the room calendar in Outlook. You can add one you use frequently, or multiples -- to do a quick check to see if there's a room available, and then create a meeting request to reserve it. And, yes, as with all things Microsoft, this is just one of several ways to see if a room is reserved or open. If you know other ways, you may choose to use those -- it's accessing all the same info, as long as you're online.

Go to the Calendar View and follow these steps.