Two meaningful updates to scheduling preferences landed today, both aimed at giving volunteers and leaders more flexibility in how they manage availability.
New Scheduling Preference Options:
Once a Quarter
Unavailable
Not every volunteer wants to serve every few weeks, and not every break needs to mean leaving a team entirely. Volunteers who want to serve a handful of times a year can now set 'Once a quarter' as their frequency, and this preference will be handled both with auto-scheduling and manual scheduling automatically, at least 12 weeks between schedules. And when someone needs a breather from one specific team, they can set their preference to 'Unavailable' without it affecting any of the other teams they're a part of.
How It Works
If you're a Team Leader, navigate to the Members tab on the Team page or open a team member's profile, and within the frequency options in the scheduling preferences column, select "Once a quarter".
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As a Volunteer, go to your profile, find the team, and set your own frequency preference the same way.
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Unavailable
One of the common requests we've heard is the ability to block out dates for a specific team without affecting others. The tricky part is that blockout dates are designed around time ranges, not teams. What volunteers were really trying to communicate was simpler: "I don't want to serve on this team right now."
That's exactly what the new "Unavailable" preference does. Whether it's a busy season, or just a small break from a particular role, a volunteer can now be marked as "Unavailable" for a specific team without being removed from it entirely. The best part, they're still available to be scheduled on any other teams they serve on. When they're ready to return, the preference can be reset at any time by the volunteer or a leader.
Team Leader Steps
Navigate to your Team page
Open the team member's drawer
Set their scheduling preference to "Unavailable"
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Go to your profile
Navigate to the preferences section
Find the team
Update your scheduling preference
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A note on manual scheduling: Leaders can still force-schedule someone marked unavailable if needed, but they'll see a conflict warning, consistent with how other conflicts work today.
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Why This Matters
Supporting the health of your volunteers is key. Aligning scheduling preferences with the needs of both team leaders and volunteers creates a clearer, better scheduling experience. This process allows for natural breaks in service based on current scheduling practices and offers more ways for your volunteers to continue contributing to your church.
Try it out
Open any team, find a volunteer, and take a look at the scheduling preference picker. Both options are available now.
💚 Team Services