5 common problems that occur when you schedule events without a business calendar

Scheduling a meeting with one other person can be difficult. When there are 10, 20, or even 50 people involved, it can be absolutely exasperating. If you've ever scheduled a larger meeting or event, you're probably familiar with the sheer number of emails and texts it takes to agree on a convenient time and place for everyone. From there, you have to send out event invites and conference links, along with follow-up emails. And after all this effort, someone might still get the date mixed up or accidentally delete the email.

With the dawn of the hybrid work model and the emphasis on maintaining a work-life balance, you can't simply go to a colleague's desk and ask them if they are free on a specific date. Emails, texts, and calls are the go-to means of communication. But scheduling events virtually can take up a lot of precious time and energy, which could be spent more productively elsewhere. Fortunately, a business calendar can help you streamline the entire event scheduling process.

Let's explore some common problems that arise when you plan events through email communications, and the solutions business calendaring provides.

Common problems with manual event scheduling

"I wonder who's available"

Consider an individual named Mark. Mark decides to host an internal conference with 25 of his org members. He sends them a request via email. As each member responds with their availability, he can't zero in on a time that works for everyone. This leads to a series of back-and-forth emails as the group attempts to pin down a meeting time.

If you don't have a business calendar, knowledge of members' availability will be a major problem when scheduling meetings. Only after contacting each individual can you decide on a meeting time. In a recent study, 46.3% of participants stated that generating a convenient time for participants should be a core functionality of a meeting scheduling application.

Most business calendars enable you to see other org members' free/busy time. This functionality ensures that there will be no individual emails or back-and-forth messages. You can easily set a meeting time that works for every member.

"Do I have any meetings that overlap?"

Before finalizing the meeting, Mark decides to check if he has any meetings overlapping at the chosen time. Unfortunately, he forgot to note his meetings down and must waste time going through his emails to ensure there is no overlap.

If you have multiple meetings on one day, there is no way to view them all in one place unless you note them down. How often have we thought of noting something down later but then forget about it completely?  Having meeting plans spread out over emails can become a huge impediment when you plan future events.

However, a business calendar displays all your events for the day in one space. When you create an event, a record of it goes on your calendar. You can easily view it, and schedule other meetings on the same day without any worry of overlap.

"I hope they attend"

After finalizing the meeting time, Mark takes some time to draft an invitation for the meeting happening in 15 days, and emails his team. However, he doesn't know for sure if everyone will attend, as all the RSVPs were verbal. Now, he simply must wait until the day of the conference to see the attendees.

When you don't have a business calendar, you have to spend extra time creating invitations, and you'll be in the dark about invitees' plans to attend.

However, with a business calendar, you only need to fill out the fields and an invite is automatically generated. Send it to all participants with a single click. The invite should come with an RSVP function, which keeps the host informed of the attendee count.

"No, no, no—I forgot the conference was today!"

After a few days, the event slips the minds of some of Mark's attendees, and they remember with an "Oh no!" on the day of the conference. Forced to transfer their other priority tasks to the backburner, they hurriedly prepare materials, and still end up late for the conference.

When events are scheduled through email, attendees don't have an easy-to-locate digital record of them. Business calendaring makes this problem obsolete, as a record of the event is created in each participant's calendar. Plus, when people start using business calendars, they usually make it a habit to check their calendars everyday to keep an eye on upcoming events and prepare for them.

"I totally missed the reminder email!"

Though Mark added a reminder to the event invite email, some of the members saw the reminder email to the meeting a little too late, as it was buried under a pile of emails. As a result, they couldn't come to the conference on time.

Reminder emails can easily be overlooked.

With a business calendar, you can set one or more reminders for events, and set them to take multiple forms, such as emails, pop-ups, and notifications. This ensures your attendees get reminded of the event in one way or another.

Efficiently schedule meetings with a business calendar

Schedule meetings quickly, organize them efficiently, and focus more on other areas of your work.

Business calendaring can easily automate manual actions, eliminate common pain points, and save you a lot of time and energy. Try out a business calendar and see how it simplifies your event scheduling process.