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  • 1.  Advice for Core Personnel Scheduling

    Posted 12-13-2024 15:02

    I am just trying to get some more information about what scheduling systems other core facilities might be using to keep track of the availability of their staff. We are currently utilizing an outlook calendar, but as more staff have joined the core it has become cluttered and difficult to keep up with. We have reached out to a couple of companies that offer more robust scheduling systems that differ from what is available on Google/Outlook calendars, but find the price to be a bit steep for the size of our facility. Any advice is really appreciated, thanks!



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    Alan Smith
    Duke University
    Durham NC
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  • 2.  RE: Advice for Core Personnel Scheduling

    Posted 12-16-2024 08:19
    Hi Alan,
    You ask a very good question, and someone recently asked a related question (I think in November) about using Outlook for centralizing communication.  I have noticed that an underlying problem is "buy-in".  At Creighton, we have Outlook and I am on several shared calendars.  The problem is, I put items on these calendars and others never look at it, or they fail to accept meetings when I send them calendar invites.  And these same people say "we need to use our shared calendar more!"

    On occasion, when I want to schedule a meeting with someone, they send me a link to Calendly, where I can see what their availability is.  I understand why individuals like calendly, but I hate having to click on multiple links to find a time that works for me.  Plus, I don't think it would work for a group.

    Another alternative is to set up a "Reservation website".  We do this for our core instrumentation, but we also have room reservations and time slots to consult with staff on the site.  And it's actually a fairly cheap and simple product (or so my IT guy claims).  Here is a link.  Let me know if you have more questions.  https://www.bookedscheduler.com/

    Anthony

    Anthony S. Stender, Ph.D. 

    Microscopy Core Manager

    Creighton University






  • 3.  RE: Advice for Core Personnel Scheduling

    Posted 12-16-2024 09:51

    Hi Alan,

    Perhaps you are already using these methods but if not, I have two suggestions for using Outlook for scheduling purposes with groups or teams that makes it a bit easier to look at visually and to foresee staffing issues.

     

    Suggestion 1: On the group calendar, do not have the employee block the actual times for example; 12/20/24 from 7:30-Noon. Employees can and should block a section of time off on their own Outlook calendar view to prevent meetings from being scheduled but not the group calendar.

     

     

     

    On the group calendar they should check the 'all day' box but write in the times out of the office in Title Field. 

     

     

    Looks like this on the group calendar.....

     

     

    This keeps all the 'out of office' info up at the top of the calendar. It stacks the out of office info in a more visual user-friendly way than blocking the actual hours out on a given which gets compressed to a point that the calendar isn't helpful or readable.

     

     

    Suggestion 2: If you have multiple cores or want to differentiate the lab staff versus the admin staff, you can color code by assigning color codes to each group by using the 'Category' options when they are putting in their out of office time. See red arrow.

     

     

    In this example, you are looking at the group calendar view - Jane is a lab tech working in the orange or X core, and Joe is an administrator who works in the blue or Y core. Once these all start to populate in you can visually see your staffing levels better.

     

     

    I hope this is helpful and allows you to continue to use Outlook for free instead of purchasing something and forcing users to have multiple calendars on different software platforms.

     

    Cheers!

    Amy  

     

    Out-of-Office Dates: 12/20/24-1/1/25

     

    Amy Gilman (she/her)

    CBSR Administrative Support

    Center for Biomedical Shared Resources

    University of Vermont – Larner College of Medicine

    149 Beaumont Ave, FMRB 150A

    Burlington, VT 05405

    (802) 656-0813

    https://www.med.uvm.edu/cbsr

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