My ask:
Is there any existing solution, or maybe a clever way of using Microsoft Office 365 to announce your intention to attend at a certain date?
Components / requirements:
- Calendar, covering future dates (at least 2 weeks forward)
- Announcement:
- Identifiable - person name
- Date (or optionally time frame)
- Comment - Allowing a place to indicate specific location (meeting room?)
- Visible to everyone (within the group/company)
- Searchable by:
- Date - listing people who are planning on attending
- Name - list the dates a person is planning on attending
The task of doing this is repetitive, similar to shift planning, but non-binding like that.
Intended use case
Like for many others (I assume), COVID-19 pandemic at first shut down our offices, and everyone were forced to work remotely.
Since then, most of our office locations around the world have opened, but attendance is optional, and in some locations open-space spots are mandated to wear masks.
The mixture of knowing it's going to be uncomfortable for most + physical presence isn't mandatory, wanting to come in is usually tied to knowing colleagues of interest are planning on coming in as well.
A way to invite people to publicly announce: "I'm planning on being in the office on Wed" (in a non binding way) could help increase presence in the office for some, and make visiting the office much more fun/palatable.
Already existing software / groupware
We already use Microsoft Office 365, with Teams and SharePoint. We also have Zoom.
Finding a solution utilizing these platforms (while still making it easy to use) will be a huge plus, especially with persuading others to use it.