As event volumes return to normal, many scheduling departments find themselves inundated with requests and their calendar packed with booked events. Consequently, scheduling and operations teams are feeling a little stressed out!
One of the best ways to respond to a rapidly rising workload is to get more efficient in handling it. Recently, we invited some Mazévo team members to share their insights in a live Mazévo Connect session: Best Practices to Simplify Scheduling and Managing Events.
Wisely Managing the Number of Bookings in an Event
Mazévo CEO Dean Evans provides the first best practice in this session. His recommendation addresses the tendency some scheduling departments have for creating one event with hundreds—or even thousands!—of bookings. An example might be having one “Wedding” event that includes bookings for every couple that gets married at your facility.
As Dean notes, Mazévo allows you to create as many bookings under one event as you like. However, potential issues can arise if you overdo it, including challenges related to selecting and changing certain bookings, for example.
He shows a reservation he created for an event with one booking each day for a year and explains that it would be much easier to manage if you broke it down into an event for each month, season, semester (in education settings), etc. And if you already have an event that you decide has too many bookings, you can use the Move Bookings tool to shift some of them to a new or existing event.
Dean also describes how you can “close” a room or a whole building for a specific time frame without booking the space for the entire period.
Helpful Tips on Mazévo Statuses
Next in the session, Vice President of Sales and Marketing Bryan Peck shares some suggestions regarding booking statuses—Confirmed, Canceled, etc.
Mazévo allows you to create the statuses you’ll use to manage events. However, Bryan points out that some organizations create 20 statuses or more. When that’s the case, the scheduling department probably isn’t using all of them and would be better off paring that list down to those that are truly necessary. As he says, “If you can get your list down to five statuses, you’re a rock star!”
Bryan goes on to list the advantages of getting to a more concise list of options, including that having fewer statuses mean less work maintaining that list and fewer decisions that people have to make when scheduling and managing events. And those are just a couple of benefits that he describes.
He also explains what it means to “disable” a status you aren’t using, how Mazévo workflows can benefit a scheduling operation, and more.
Insights on Event Types
Mazévo [Title?] Wendy Newlon takes the stage next to talk about streamlining Mazévo event types. She pokes a little fun at the “exuberance” some organizations have when creating an abundance of event types.
Wendy notes that some Mazévo customers create a long list of them, believing that’s the only way to get statistics on the number of events needing catering, equipment, etc. But she corrects that misconception, showing how you can get that information on reports.
The same is true of creating a large number of event types to reflect the different types of groups that hold events at your facility. Here again, Mazévo’s reporting capabilities have you covered! She continues by explaining that if you have too many event types, you may confuse people who are requesting space.
Wendy also provides some recommendations regarding event questions.
Security Groups, Global Administrators, Pricing Plans, and More!
As the session continues, Dean, Bryan, and Wendy share additional best practices focused on “keeping things simple” and tidy—in Mazévo and your scheduling operations. Then, they answer some great questions from attendees.
If you’ve got questions (after watching this Mazévo Connect session or otherwise), we’re happy to answer them. Contact us anytime!
We can also provide a live demo tailored to your needs that lets you see how you could use Mazévo in your scheduling environment.
