Setting sustaining date in the future

[sbradshaw]

One of the assistant clerks in my ward noticed something that is either an awesome new feature on Leader and Clerk Resource 3.0 beta, or a bug. I prefer to hope that it's a new feature: It seems to be possible to give someone a "date sustained" in the future. We haven't had a chance to test it fully yet, but these are my assumptions on how it could/should work:
1) When a person accepts a calling, if the clerk is present, he can record the calling right away with the sustained date set to the next Sunday.
2) The person with the calling will then receive any online access associated with his calling, and can start getting oriented right away, before he is sustained.
3) Only the bishopric and clerks can see people who are to be sustained in the future, so it can be kept confidential until they are actually sustained.

Has anyone had a chance to try this out, or is there a developer who can shed some light onto this and make sure I'm understanding that process correctly?

[mevans]

I'm not in the beta test, so I can't see what you see, but I'd be leery of putting in a future date. I'd much rather see something like "pending". Sometimes something comes up and a person intended to be sustained isn't sustained as planned on that day. If that happened and someone forgot to update the sustaining date, then it would go public before it's supposed to. Probably the most frequent situation where I've seen that happen is that they want the person to be at church when the sustaining is done and might wait until the next week if the person isn't there.

[sbradshaw]

Yes, it'd be nice if you could put a future date, then it queued them all in a "Sustainings List" grouped by date to be sustained.

On Sunday, you could go to the Sustainings List report and print it out to use during sacrament meeting.

Later on in the day, a clerk could go back to the list online and, for each person on the list, 1) mark them as sustained (and set apart, if applicable), 2) change the sustained date, or 3) cancel their calling.

This is all hypothetical. Right now all I see is that it is currently possible to set a sustained date in the future.

[russellhltn]

I prefer to hope that it's a new feature:

Is there anything about it in "Help"?

[sbradshaw]

Is there anything about it in "Help"?

I don't see anything. There's not a specific Help file for the beta – only the release notes reference it.

[jonesrk]

2) The person with the calling will then receive any online access associated with his calling, and can start getting oriented right away, before he is sustained.

That kind of calling with a future date has always been available in CDOL. I know that until it goes active there will not be any rights given. In CDOL most people can't see the pending callings (including the bishopric).
When that date rolls around CDOL will automatically move the calling to active.

3) Only the bishopric and clerks can see people who are to be sustained in the future, so it can be kept confidential until they are actually sustained.

I doubt that this is the case. I'm guessing that anyone that can see callings will be able to see it.

We have discussed adding in workflow for callings after the bishopric has approved them to help track issuing the call and release and getting them sustained, but at this point I'm guessing that it won't happen until most of the non finance functionality of MLS has been moved to LCR.

[kisaac]

I'm not in the beta test, so I can't see what you see, but I'd be leery of putting in a future date.

I can't test it or see it either, but as a "past clerk" who tracked such things, I'm with you! Don't put a date sustained date in until they are sustained, it's not a "pending sustaining" option yet (see jonesrk comment below.) If you start putting in future dates the question of "did we actually sustain them on that date?" then becomes necessary and yes, I think your changes would become public too early on LDS.org. In CDOL, as in the case of a bishop or other major call, I can see the need to "pend" such calls, but for most standard ward callings...I see problems if somebody uses this as a "pending sustaining" box.

We have discussed adding in workflow for callings...to help track issuing the call and release and getting them sustained

Why? We could just go back to our magnetic board with all the callings listed along the top, and members names on little magnetic pieces that we can reposition over and over and over, kinda like a giant ward Sudoku puzzle!

[scgallafent]

Just to make sure everyone understands clearly:

Putting a calling in with a future date is a Bad Idea™. If you choose to enter a calling this way, it will lie in wait in CDOL waiting to bite you in the behind. The member will not get "early access" to LCR or anything like that.

I just tested to verify this. There is now a "Hymnbook Mender" calling in my ward that I will suddenly have on June 20. I no longer have the ability to modify or view that calling until June 20. Hopefully I remember to fix it. Maybe I'll walk down to rkjones' desk and have him fix it....

I have logged an issue to fix this in LCR. Right now it is a bug. There has been some discussion of a pending calling feature, but no firm decision on whether to or when such a feature would be ever be implemented.

[sbradshaw]

Darn, I shouldn't have mentioned it, then.

[jonesrk]

Maybe I'll walk down to rkjones' desk and have him fix it....

I just saved you a walk. You no longer have a pending position.