Outlook has some often-overlooked tools that can be particularly helpful for remote teams. Some of us are in different time zones or working erratic hours while juggling work and family life from home. Here are some tips that may help your routine.
Scheduling an email to send at a later day or time
Let’s say you are based out of Colorado and your colleague is based in Hawaii. It’s 9am your time and Hawaii is 4 hours earlier. You need an urgent email to land on the top of your colleague’s inbox as soon as the Hawaii workday begins. Did you know you can schedule your email to send at a specific time? Look for the dropdown arrow to the right of the Send button. Click on the arrow and it will give you the option to Send Later. Click there and a window will pop up allowing you to enter the date and time you would like the email to send and Aloha!
Scheduling Assistant
Now you need to schedule a meeting with multiple remote colleagues to discuss the email you sent to Hawaii. How do you know what time works for everyone, no matter what time zone they’re in or what hours they are working? Start with scheduling a meeting as you normally would. Enter all of the contacts that will need to participate and the preferred date. To see all of the participant’s calendars, click on the Scheduling button to the right of the Appointment button.
Here, you’ll see all of the participant’s schedules appear. Find a gap where no one’s time is booked and navigate back to the invitation by clicking on Appointment. Enter in the best time that you found along with any other necessary details & send the invitation.