Some ministers scheduled more than once while others are NOT scheduled

[Edward Brink]

We just completed training for new ministers, added them to MSP and ran a schedule.  In the schedule, some ministers were scheduled more than once and others were not scheduled.  This is the first time that I am using MSP to schedule ministers although my church has been using the program for a number of years.  I thought the program would schedule everyone at least once and then go back and add ministers for a second time of service until all positions were filled.  But that doesn't seem to be happening.  Is there a way to make this happen?  I really would like the new ministers to be scheduled now that they have been trained.  I know I could do that scheduling manually but that seems to defeat the purpose of having the program.

[St. Mary's Liturgy Office]

This happened to me quite often when I first began using MSP.  For whatever reason, some would be left off the schedule while others were scheduled two or three times.   I used to have to painstakingly cross check my list of ministers to make sure everyone was scheduled.  After a few months of doing that, I plug ministers in manually now. I find it much easier.  And I am confident that everyone is included.  

On Tue, Nov 19, 2024 at 4:08 PM Edward Brink <edward...@chaminade.edu> wrote:

We just completed training for new ministers, added them to MSP and ran a schedule.  In the schedule, some ministers were scheduled more than once and others were not scheduled.  This is the first time that I am using MSP to schedule ministers although my church has been using the program for a number of years.  I thought the program would schedule everyone at least once and then go back and add ministers for a second time of service until all positions were filled.  But that doesn't seem to be happening.  Is there a way to make this happen?  I really would like the new ministers to be scheduled now that they have been trained.  I know I could do that scheduling manually but that seems to defeat the purpose of having the program.

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[Krista Kutz]

Good morning, and thank you for reaching out to this Group about your scheduling distribution questions!

I wanted to chime in with a few MSP tips. In the scheduling cycle (which is a great resource to anyone who is new or needs reminders when they are running a new schedule!), we recommend checking the distribution report to ensure a fair distribution of assignments. This will save St. Mary's some time in checking the schedule! 

Edward, in your specific example, you mentioned adding a bunch of new volunteers, which is one of the times you might want to clear the historical data (What is historical scheduling data, and why would I want to clear it (or not)?). 

However, if anyone ever runs a schedule and notices the distribution is not what they want, please send in your data files (Help - Send Data Files to Tech Support) along with what you want to happen and examples of specific volunteers who are not following that. Our support team is specially trained in all of the various settings and options in MSP to recommend ways to achieve your scheduling goals! 

Remember that unlimited technical support is included with all MSP subscriptions, so any scheduling question—big or small—please don't hesitate to send our way to support@ministryschedulerpro.com. 

Thank you for being in the MSP community!

Blessings,

Krista

Rotunda Software

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/using-ministry-scheduler-pro/CANOx-KCQEjoTGr8UPYJ3CE_xsLYmk%2B-VFBwzFfC%3D042%3DZk_4kQ%40mail.gmail.com.

[Klaus Adam]

It would be interesting to see the logic that the system uses to make assignments. Without that knowledge, we can’t religion judge whether the system is being fair. Each time I make a schedule I review it and try to Kyhv some balance among all my people, and that is easy to do because the reports the system can give. I don’t have a resolution for the problem because I don’t really understand what the problem with the system is to Manually schedule each individual makes the system all that useless.

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[richard...@gmail.com]

Actually, I want to chime in here and say that I have the same problem.  My Lectors are not scheduled evenly at all.  There are several that get three to four times the assignments.  I used to chalk it up to can’t serve dates getting in the way.  That can’t explain the schedule it created.  I reset the history, that doesn’t help.  When I look in detail at the schedule of the volunteers who are scheduled often, I see many other volunteers that have no conflicts and could easily take the spot.  I set the scheduling frequency of my lectors to 2x per month for three months and let the autoscheduler expand this to fill any open positions. 

 

When I added a whole new group of Eucharistic Ministers, the next schedule overloaded the poor new people and leaving the more veterans with less opportunities.  That’s when I started resetting the history each time before I run autoscheduler.  That helped.  My issue is with the Lector ministry.

 

I need to go through the ministry distribution report each time and make several manual adjustments to even it out more. I just finished that as we have a Dec-Feb schedule.   It’s time consuming, but the desktop version has the tools that make it easier.  It is a bit harder to do that on the web admin terminal, but it can get done if you have pencil and paper handy or a good memory.

 

However I have never had available regular  volunteers not scheduled at all.  When I do it is because of my configuration error on their profile (preassignments during can’t serve times, or preassignments only with no autoscheduling but no listed preassignments)  Everyone gets at least one assignment from the autoscheduler.  I would like around 5 assignments for each during the three months.  I have to do that manually.

 

Is there anything else we could configure that is not on the FAQ list that I am forgetting?  Is there a list in one place of all the things I can adjust to even out the assignments?  This is causing extra work for me and my Lector ministry leader that I don’t think we should be doing.

 

-Richard Brehove

St. Margaret Mary, Lomita CA

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[Krista Kutz]

Good morning all!

Richard, thank you for chiming in with your feedback and questions. Glad to hear that the Ministry Distribution Report has been a good resource for you when running the schedule, and that you've found resetting the history to help with your EM assignment distribution.

Since you mentioned wanting to see a more even Lector ministry distribution, I wanted to offer 2 more resources for you and other schedulers in this group:

1. Try turning on autonomous scheduling for your Lectors: https://rotundasoftware.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/115005923108-Using-Schedule-this-ministry-autonomously-to-even-out-distribution

2. Also take a look at this help article with a list of suggestions to even out distribution: https://rotundasoftware.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/202517624-Why-are-some-people-scheduled-more-often-than-others-The-distribution-seems-unfair

The next time you run the auto-scheduler, if your ideal scheduling goals are not being met, please send in your data files (Help - Send Data Files to Tech Support) along with your preferred outcome and the names of specific volunteers whose assignments don't match that outcome. Our support team is happy to take a close look at your settings and give more personalized recommendations. 

I hope this helps! Thank you all for everything you do for your volunteers & ministries!

Blessings to all,

Krista

Rotunda Software

[Emily Schmid]

I’ve experienced similar issues in the past and have tried a variety of solutions, many of which have already been mentioned here. I’d like to share one approach that has worked well for me to achieve more balanced scheduling.

I now auto-schedule ministries separately or in smaller groups rather than all at once. I found that when scheduling everything together, people who serve in multiple ministries were often overloaded in one ministry and not scheduled at all in another. For example, Susie might be scheduled as an Extraordinary Minister (EM) frequently because we need more people in that role, but she would never be scheduled as a lector. Additionally, individuals who serve in only one ministry (e.g., exclusively as EMs) were sometimes left without assignments.

What I noticed was that the scheduler tends to prioritize ministries with a larger number of spots over those with fewer spots.

To address this, I developed an order in which I auto-schedule ministries, which took some trial and error to perfect. My current order is:

1. Sacristans
2. Lectors & Altar Servers
3. Greeters/Ushers
4. Eucharistic Ministers

By scheduling in this order (along with clearing the history and applying the other suggestions already mentioned), I’ve been able to distribute assignments more evenly and ensure everyone is fairly scheduled. 

I hope this approach is helpful!

On Thursday, November 21, 2024 at 9:00:49 AM UTC-6 richard...@gmail.com wrote:

[Pecrisman]

All great suggestions, but I don’t believe anyone mentioned having multiple service times. The number of ministers available for each service can vary greatly, so distribution of assignments can seem unbalanced.

Sent from my iPhone

On Nov 21, 2024, at 9:45 AM, Emily Schmid <emily...@gmail.com> wrote:



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[richard...@gmail.com]

Thank you Krista

I already do have both EM and Lectors selected to schedule autonomously, but I run the auto schedule for both at the same time.  I think I’ll take the suggeston about auto scheduling one at time. Sounds like something I could try.

 

Thanks for the list of suggestions below.  I will investigate each.

 

-Richard Brehove

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