Finding a common time among a group of people to create a schedule item, such as a meeting, can be challenging. Even more difficult is when an item on the calendar involving a lot of people needs to be rescheduled. I find this situation to be ripe with possibilities of miscommunications, frustrations, and some people not receiving the update.
I’ve taken to adopting two rules that I have found very helpful in combating this:
Rule #1 - You can change an appointment/meeting ONCE
People are busy. They have their own calendars that are full, and they are also likely plugged into multiple calendars – their personal calendar, their work calendar, their spouses’ calendar, their kids’ calendar(s), etc. Making a proposed change to their calendar involves more than just finding an open slot – it may involve moving other stuff around to accommodate, which can result in a trickle-down effect on other calendars they are involved in. If I try to follow-up a change with a subsequent change (especially if the subsequent change is to go back to the original plan), things get confusing very quickly, and it is easy for mistakes to be made.
In short, attention is a resource, people have a limited amount of it, and changing a calendar item is often resource intensive. If I am going to make a schedule change, I really try to ensure that it is absolutely necessary, because I’ve found that once a change is made, it’s best to consider it immutable.
Rule #2 - Get positive confirmation that the change was received. Don’t assume.
Once I’ve decided to make a change, I make it clear to people that I am expecting confirmation from them about said change.
If I make a change in a schedule item without requesting confirmation, I don’t know whether they are OK with the change and just stayed silent, or whether they missed the request, or they are looking into whether they can accommodate and it’s just taking time on their end, or any number of complications that may have arisen. Requesting confirmation dramatically reduces the chance of a miscommunication – even if the response is ‘I may be able to accommodate, but give me a few days to verify other parts of my schedule’. At least the other person and I are on the same page.
Regarding assumptions - the only place I find they can be made is when a change is being proposed, and it’s done so with the statement “I’m going to assume that unless I hear from you, we are sticking with the original plan”.
The other reason to request confirmation is that if someone sees an updated calendar item, they check their schedule and are OK with it, then move on – there is a very good chance that they mentally didn’t register that change. Replying with a confirmation requires a level of cognition on their part that makes it far more likely that they will remember the change was made.
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