Prior: Part 8:  Bury the Old Leadership Calendar Legacy and Those Who Practice It

It isn't just a digital calendar ... It is also a digital building scheduling system. What's more, it works beautifully, provided some really basic procedures are followed.

Schedule the Event AND the Building

If you are going to hold an event, chances are you need to hold it somewhere in the meetinghouse. When you calendar it, you need to schedule the building and any equipment you need as well.

In the past, leadership handled all of this with a handful of people with keys to the building, the rooms and the equipment. No more. If you put an item on the calendar, you need to schedule what you need. It's up to you.

This isn't difficult. All you have to do is fill in the digital form and it prompts you for everything.

So, what procedures need to be followed? Start with the following:

Select a name for the event. If you are having a Relief Society Christmas Party, I would list it like this:

FW1 Relief Society Christmas Party

I reside in the Fort Wayne 1st Ward and we have two other congregations that meet in our building. When this happens, the Church instructs us:

When you have wards sharing buildings, it is helpful to have the ward’s initials at the beginning of an event title. That way, when you view the building calendar, which has events for multiple wards, it will be easier to see which events belong to a certain ward. If wards forget to use this naming convention, the building scheduler can rename the event to include it.

If yours is the only congregation in the building, then it isn't much of an issue, unless you want to train people to include it so there isn't confusion when the wards are split or when people move to other units. It would probably be best to take good habits with them instead of bad.

So, I would recommend you all adopt this convention now. It would still help those who have their own building. At least private events wouldn't have the abbreviated moniker and they could be easily identified as private events instead of ward events.

You will be prompted to choose which calendar the event will go on. Choose carefully. This can have a big impact.

One thing people seem to be leaving out these days when they schedule a calendar event is setup and cleanup. This is crucial! If the prior event in the room ends at 1 pm, the computer will let you schedule your event at 1 pm but it is doubtful you can start the instant the other event ends. Even if it is only 15 minutes for setup, schedule it!

When a wedding was recently scheduled, the bride and groom agreed on setup and cleanup. He freaked out a bit when he saw the event on the calendar scheduled for the time it would begin. He said, "I thought we agreed we would schedule a certain amount of time for setup and cleanup?" She showed him how she had scheduled the requisite time and reserved what they needed. However, the calendar simply showed the start time for the wedding. He breathed in relief.

You Can Even Schedule Equipment

You can schedule equipment, but I don't know how to do that. It is managed at the stake level and takes some doing. I'll cover this a bit more later.

Consider if you are a teacher, you could schedule the television and other equipment you want and breathe easily knowing that it is reserved for your use and wouldn't be AWOL when you needed it.

So, What Does the Building Scheduler Do Then?

This is an obvious question. What does the Building Scheduler do if everyone is scheduling their own stuff on the computer themselves?

This new digital responsibility can cause some confusion because most people assume it is something else, something associated with the past. It isn't. It also isn't the Bishop currently assigned building responsibilities when more than one unit shares a building.

There is a whole section that explains this on the Help Center under Calendar and Building Schedulers:

Building schedulers are responsible for overseeing events related to their assigned location, but they do not schedule stake or ward events. The stake and ward calendar editors schedule their own events and reserve the needed building and rooms without contacting the building scheduler.

So, Building Schedulers schedule building events. Building events include the following:

  • Private Events
    • weddings
    • funerals and memorial services
    • private parties
  • Facilities work
    • major cleaning
    • maintenance
  • Non Stake/Ward/Branch events
    • Mission interviews
    • Mission and missionary events
These events all take place at the building, but they aren't stake or ward events, per se. They are not relevant to the general membership and should not be included on stake and ward calendars. They are building events, nothing more, and should only go on the building calendar.

Building Schedulers Oversee the Building Events

Building Schedulers oversee the events that get placed on the location/building calendar. That means that if I didn't remember to add the FW1 next to the Relief Society Christmas Party, the Building Scheduler could add it.

Building Schedulers should oversee the building calendar to make certain all building events, including stake and ward events, are scheduled correctly by the wards and stakes.

The Scoop on Building Schedulers

So, how do you get the job of Building Scheduler? Again, from the Help Center:

A stake calendar administrator, such as the stake clerk or stake executive secretary, assigns building schedulers in the calendar system to oversee locations. It is not enough to put their calling in Leader and Clerk Resources (LCR). The building scheduler must be assigned to a specific building using the Locations and Rooms option in the calendar. To check if you have been properly set up as a building scheduler, click on the building name in the calendar’s left panel. You should see your name.

The above is a bit confusing. If it is entered into the LCR, then it is probably a calling that needs to be sustained and set apart.

However, that isn't all. The Building Scheduler must be ASSIGNED to a specific building in the system, otherwise, they can't do anything at all.

The Church suggests that each building needs a particular Building Scheduler. This makes sense. Each building is unique, the Building Scheduler needs to attend at the building he or she manages.

Building Schedulers are crucial parts of the digital calendaring system. Their responsibilities are almost entirely online but they are essential to the system functioning correctly.

Again from the Help Center:

Building schedulers monitor the events being scheduled and make sure they conform to handbook and other local building policies. They can help resolve scheduling conflicts. They have the ability to make appropriate changes to events associated with the building, even events on stake and ward calendars, assisting the editors of the various calendars.

That sums things up nicely. 

Next: Part 10: Get in Sync and Make it Sync!

Assignment for Leaders: Go to the Calendar and locate the building you attend. Click on the link for the building, this will bring up who the Building Scheduler is. If you don't have one, start lobbying for one and educating others on why you need one.

Assignment for Members: Go to the Calendar and locate the building you attend. Click on the link for the building, this will bring up who the Building Scheduler is. Now you know.


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