Stake Leaders unable to view Ward Calendars

[westonm]

As a member of the Stake presidency we had hoped to use the new calendar to assist wards to communicate with each other as well as coordinate events throughout the stake. One of the significant limitations of the classic calendar is that it did not allow layering which contributed to scheduling conflicts. By allowing the creation of private ward calendars that are only viewable to ward members the new calendar sets up the same isolation of event planning the the classic view had.
Wards need to be able to see (if they chose) what another ward is doing so that they can collaborate and the Stake needs to be able to see all calendars so that we don't over schedule.
Resolving scheduling conflicts takes time and is not fun.
Is there a way for leaders to see all calendars necessary. The only solution that I can think of is to tell our wards not to use local ward calendars and only post to calendars created by the stake for their use.
Please tell me you have a better way.

[jdlessley]

As a member of the Stake presidency we had hoped to use the new calendar to assist wards to communicate with each other as well as coordinate events throughout the stake. One of the significant limitations of the classic calendar is that it did not allow layering which contributed to scheduling conflicts. By allowing the creation of private ward calendars that are only viewable to ward members the new calendar sets up the same isolation of event planning the the classic view had.

Wards need to be able to see (if they chose) what another ward is doing so that they can collaborate and the Stake needs to be able to see all calendars so that we don't over schedule.
...
Is there a way for leaders to see all calendars necessary.

While members of one ward cannot view the calendars of another ward, those who are approvers, editors, or building schedulers can view the events of other wards. See the View Calendars of Other Wards section of the calendar help for further information.

This is not the most elegant method to accomplish stake scheduling deconfliction but it does permit viewing events across the stake. Members who do not have approver, editor, or building scheduler privileges cannot use this method to see the events of other wards. But then there should be no reason they would need to do so since leaders in the ward and stake will most likely either be an approver or an editor of at least one calendar.

There may be changes/enhancements to the calendar scheduled for release next month that may make it easier to deconflict events across the stake. We can only wait and see.

[crislapi]

These might be good suggestions to get back to the developers. A recent post was seeking interested participants to help in the development of calendar 2.0. See this thread for more info.

[westonm]

Thank you for your comments.
We have tried viewing the calendars of other wards by using the locations feature but as you mentioned it only shows events not wards. Not very elegant considering that people who are trying to conflict need to contact ward schedulers or organizations.

We then tried the other approach which was to have them created as stake calendars. This does work but when trying to attach rights by calling you are only able to see the stake callings. You can get around this be assigning individual members but again its something that needs work to make it more seamless. You should be able to publish a ward calendar at the stake level and retain the ability to assign by ward calling.

You did make one comment that I'm not certain that you fully thought through. You mentioned should be no reason for members of other wards to need to see other ward calendars. Whether this is true or not should not mean that the calendar is restricted or private. Any member of any ward should if they need to be able to see (if they choose what is happening in another ward as there are many reasons for wanting to visit another ward or participate in activities.(Particularly at the youth and Young Single Adult level.)

mrw

[jdlessley]

You did make one comment that I'm not certain that you fully thought through. You mentioned should be no reason for members of other wards to need to see other ward calendars. Whether this is true or not should not mean that the calendar is restricted or private. Any member of any ward should if they need to be able to see (if they choose what is happening in another ward as there are many reasons for wanting to visit another ward or participate in activities.(Particularly at the youth and Young Single Adult level.)

I disagree that all members of one ward should be able to see the events/activities, particularly youth events, of another ward. It is important that youth protection be considered when allowing individuals to view the activities schedules of youth. It is important that the leadership of a ward have control as to who views sensitive event schedules outside their unit. Even within the unit the activities of youth should be restricted to those directly involved with youth such as the bishopric, youth leaders, parents, and the youth themselves. Unfortunately, membership in the Church is no guarantee against preditory or malicious behavior.

Having said that I do see a need for certain leaders of one ward to coordinate events and schedules with another ward. I do think stake leaders should be able to view the calendars of any ward/branch within the stake.

I think it would be possible to permit view rights to members outside the ward similar to the current method used for granting view rights in private calendars. Only this would be for callings in other wards. Even "by name" view permissions could be granted. Who has control of the view rights could be accomplished at any level. The most logical to me would be for anyone with editor rights to be able to grant view rights.