Outlook meeting responses

[Guest]

I recently noticed in Outlook 2000 that if you respond to a meeting request
but choose to not send a response to the meeting organizer, your response
does not update in the meeting attendee status. Until I discovered this
"feature", I would generally not send a response when I recognized that I was
one of many (>25) in a distribution list. I thought I was being polite to
the sender by not cluttering their mail box with yet another meeting
response. I assumed though, that my status for the meeting would be updated.
What value is there for the sender to request a meeting but allow the
requestee to not provide a response. Wouldn't it be safe to assume that I am
interested in your response to a meeting request I made? The way it is setup
in 2000 leaves it open to miscommunication, redundant communication and
wasted effort trying to track down who is coming and not coming to a meeting
request. I think there is value in not sending a response to a persons inbox
but I think it is mandatory to update the status in the meeting request.

What do you think?

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[Sue Mosher [MVP-Outlook]]

I think it should be the user's choice to send a response, as designed. There are certainly meeting request scenarios where responding isn't necessary. Note that only such a response can update the meeting for the sender, since the invitees almost certainly do not have permission to write to the item in the meeting organizer's calendar.

 

[Guest]

I am certainly glad that you decided to post your response to my question.
It wouldn't be too helpful to me if you answered the question and kept it to
yourself which is what your post suggested.

If a user pushes one of the accept, tentative or decline buttons, this
information should be automatically sent. If the user does not want to
respond to the request, they should delete the email. Case in point, I
organize a meeting with you and you accept but do not send me a response. I
look at the meeting request 5 minutes before the meeting, notice that you
have not responded, try to call you but you have left your office and are
coming to the meeting so I decide to not go to my meeting because you didn't
respond to me and you are sitting in the meeting wondering where I am. There
are so many layers of inefficiency built into this "feature".

 

[Sue Mosher [MVP-Outlook]]

Unfortunately, doing it the way you describe probably would require a complete redesign of the entire Outlook meeting request architecture. As with any system that involves collaboration -- be it electronic or face-to-face -- some degree of training is required to set expectations and share best practices.

Your additional comments, though, do flesh out the scenario better so that Microsoft can consider them for future versions.

--
Sue Mosher, Outlook MVP
Author of Configuring Microsoft Outlook 2003

and Microsoft Outlook Programming - Jumpstart for
Administrators, Power Users, and Developers