Exchange Calendar Survival Tips 1/7/2009

In today's update, we've included 8 guidelines (4 for meeting participants and 4 for meeting organizers) to use when working in the new Exchange calendaring system.

4 GUIDELINES FOR MEETING PARTICIPANTS

• MAKE A CHOICE
  Accept, accept as tentative, or decline each meeting request that you receive, especially if it is an update to a meeting request that you previously accepted. By making a choice, you keep the meeting organizer apprised of your decision and you prevent the meetings that you want to attend from being accidentally deleted. If you need to attend a meeting but can't at the time it is scheduled, you can propose a new time for the meeting.  Try not to delete a meeting request outright because this is one way that meetings get "lost."
• KEEP YOUR MEETING NOTES SEPARATE
  As a meeting attendee, avoid adding your own private notes to the body of a meeting request in your calendar. If the organizer updates the meeting, your notes are lost.
• AVOID FORWARDING MEETING REQUESTS
  Forwarding a meeting request to someone can automatically invite that person to the meeting. If you receive an invitation for a meeting and believe someone else should also attend it, instead of forwarding the meeting request to that person, ask the meeting organizer to add that person to the attendee list, and then to send everyone an updated meeting request. This avoids suprising the organizer with an unexpected attendee and helps prevent lost meeting requests.
• REMOVE IT RIGHT
  If you receive a meeting cancellation, click Remove from Calendar to remove the meeting from your calendar. If you are using integrated email and calendaring, deleting the cancellation from your Inbox won't remove the meeting from your calendar.

4 GUIDELINES FOR MEETING ORGANIZERS

• SEND UPDATES
  After modifying one of your own meeting requests, remember to click Send Update to send the updated request to all recipients.
• THERE IS ALWAYS ROOM FOR ONE MORE
  If you are the meeting organizer and you want to invite another person after sending the original meeting request, add the person to the attendee list (the To line) of the original meeting series or occurrence, and then send an update to all attendees.  Note: If you remove anyone from that update message, you are removing them from the meeting.
• BE CAREFUL WITH DISTRIBUTION LISTS
  Try to avoid sending meeting requests to distribution lists (DLs), particularly ones that you are a member of. If you need to invite all the members of a distribution list, expand the list in the To line before sending the request. If you need to add or remove attendees from a meeting request that you already sent to an unexpanded distribution list, don't expand the list and start adding or deleting names. Instead, cancel the meeting and create a new one.
• CHANGING MEETING ORGANIZERS
  If a recurring meeting is changing to a new organizer, there is not a way to reassign the ownership of the meeting. The original organizer should send an update with a new end date — the past meetings remain on everyone’s calendars, but future occurrences after the end date are removed. The new meeting organizer should send a new meeting request for meetings in the future.

QUESTIONS?

Many questions can be answered by reviewing the information found on the OIT Exchange web site at http://oit.nd.edu/exchange.  The OIT has also created Quick Reference Guides that will walk you through these types of questions, as well as many other common calendaring functions.  Quick reference guides are available for Outlook 2007, Outlook 2003, Entourage 2008, OWA with IE, and OWA with other web browsers, and you can find them all at: http://oit.nd.edu/exchange/training.shtml#qrg

Don't forget!  You can still register for hands-on training by visiting http://endeavor.nd.edu.  Courses are available for Outlook and Entourage, as well as for people who act as a delegate for others or those who do not.  Information how how to register for classes can be found at http://hr.nd.edu/prodevelopment/Endeavor.shtml . If you have questions about training, please contact training@nd.edu or call 1-7227.

If you need further assistance, please contact your departmental IT support staff or the OIT Help Desk at 574-631-8111 or oithelp@nd.edu.