A month of serving rosters: blockout dates, invitations, replacements, reminders

Filling a roster one Sunday at a time eats your whole week. A month in one sitting takes about half an hour, once the groundwork is in place. Nearly all of it happens in the browser.

Two weeks before the month starts

Create the plans. The schedule only shows services that exist. Without them you'll see "No plans in this range." Add the month's services in Planning → Services. Duplicate works well, and so does a template.

Ask for blockout dates. Send one message: "Please add your dates away by Friday." In the app: Church → Personal group → My blockout dates → +. For regular commitments, Every week repeats a range of up to 7 days. Suggest a roster skips those people, and the schedule marks them.

Check the groundwork once. Open each team in Planning → Teams:

• How often is set for anyone with a limit, for example "max 2× a month",
• each person has their positions ticked. This part is done in the phone app: Church → Teams → the team → swipe the person left → Positions. Without it, Suggest a roster and automatic replacement never pick them, though you can still assign them by hand.

A week before: build it

1. Open Planning → Schedule. Pick the range and, if you like, one team.
2. Click Suggest a roster. It fills empty places only, starts with people who haven't served for the longest, skips anyone unavailable and keeps to their limits.
3. Read the suggestions. Replace with… swaps a person, and the note next to each name tells you why they were picked.
4. Click Approve suggestions. This saves drafts, and nobody has been told anything yet.
5. Look over the table. Drag a person onto a cell, or use the Roster button in the cell. Colours mark unfilled places, blockout dates and a second role on the same day.

Then read it with a pastor's eyes. Is someone serving three weeks running because they never say no? The tool sees limits, not tiredness.

Sending invitations

The Send invitations button sits under the service name at the top of its column. You send service by service, so you can hold back a Sunday you're unsure about.

You'll see something like "Sent 5, skipped 1." Skipped means that person has neither an email address nor the app, so nothing reached them. Phone them yourself.

Each person gets an email with a Respond button and answers on a web page, with no sign-in. On iPhone and iPad they can answer straight from the notification. In the browser, signed-in people also answer in Mine → My serving.

No answer after a few days? On iPhone or iPad, the plan's roster has Remind (N), which sends the invitation again to everyone who hasn't answered, at most once a day per person.

When someone declines

There are three routes, from the least work for you to the most:

• They arrange it themselves. After Can't make it, the person can pick someone on the team who has agreed to cover for them and click Decline, … replaces me. You and the replacement are both told. Mention this option to your team: it saves a lot of messages.
• Automatic replacement. On the team page, turn on After a decline, invite the next person automatically. The best-matching available person is invited right away. It stops after 3 attempts per spot, and never runs less than 24 hours before the service.
• You pick. Next to a decline, Suggested replacement offers up to three people with a reason. Add draft, then send the invitation with Send invites on the plan's Roster page.

Inside the last 24 hours, phone someone. A personal call beats any notification on a Saturday night.

A place nobody wants

For a position that's hard to fill, Mark as open on the Schedule page lets people take a date themselves. Choose the position and several plans at once. People who have that position see it in Mine → My serving, under Open spots, and I'll take it puts them straight on the roster.

Reminders

Set this once: Settings → Reminders, section Serving reminders. Choose Hours before and a Channel, then click Save reminders. 48 hours and Both (email and push) is a good start. If you pick Push and someone can't get a push, they get an email instead, so the reminder isn't lost.

This takes the nagging off your plate. Everyone who's been invited or has accepted gets one reminder, by the church's rule.

Next month

Keep the same rhythm: plans and blockout dates two weeks ahead, the roster a week ahead. After two or three rounds, people will add their dates without being asked, because they'll have seen what happens when they do.

What's next

• My serving: responding and blockout dates
• Service plans and serving rosters