Tech Forum

laurenmajor wrote:Ward mission leader access to Area Book Planner is being considered.

Hey Lauren, long time no chat!

Do you have any insight into whether the Ward Council is being considered for this access (as opposed to just the Ward Mission Leader). Or even just the bishopric? We've been working closely as a WC on the missionary effort in our ward, and this tool could be a big help.

Thanks!
Brad Morgan

Why would the Ward Council need access to the area book? I would think the only person we would want in that is the Ward Mission Leader

Giving Digital Area Book access to ward mission leaders/missionaries and ward council members would be IMMENSELY useful in bridging the gap between missionaries and members. Please keep us updated if this is considered and/or approved.

palarkin wrote:Giving Digital Area Book access to ward mission leaders/missionaries and ward council members would be IMMENSELY useful in bridging the gap between missionaries and members. Please keep us updated if this is considered and/or approved.

It already exists. I'm staring at ours now. As stated, your missionaries have to be using the online area book before you can see anything.

Is access to the digital area book the same as viewing the "ward progress record" on LCR?
If so,read-only access is a start.
Can the ward mission leader use the same tool to enter information about families that ward missionaries are working wi?
These two groups of people (those the full-time missionaries work with and those ward missionaries work with) may be different.

Thanks.
Ward Mission leader

Hello everyone,
I am a missionary in the Colorado Fort Collins Mission. We have iPads, and more recently Samsung tablets.

The (still read only for now) Progress Record is available in LDS Tools under Reports for members of the Ward council. This is a new feature as of this spring.

You can also ask your missionaries to print off the Progress Record from the Missionary Portal (missionary.lds.org) that only they have access to. As stated several times before, this same progress report is available from Leader and Clerk Resources.

It looks like for now, only the missionaries will have edit access to their area books, as I have never been told otherwise.

I will keep replying on this page if anyone has additional questions about what a missionary can access and about what the Ward council can see.

tomcatt wrote:Hello everyone,It looks like for now, only the missionaries will have edit access to their area books, as I have never been told otherwise.

Are you stating that from knowledge of the entire mission field or is that how your mission has it set up? Each mission area can be different and it may be possible that each mission president decides accessibility for their mission.

The AreaBook planner app is currently only in the "App Catalog" store provided in the configuration for the IPads/Samsung S2 tablets.

AreaBook is set up to follow Preach My Gospel and the missionary broadcast from earlier this year, with a "progress report" that shows the same information from the paper form, just automatically generated, and filterable. Our leaders can see our key indicators, but not our AreaBook. On page 140 of Preach My Gospel, it has a graphic under the heading "The Area Book and Planning and Reporting tools" that shows that there is less and less information shared from the area book as you get further up the chain of command. The Area Book for Missionaries, The Progress Record for the Ward Council, and so on up.

So until we see an addendum to Preach My Gospel to that effect, the current information policies will apply. This is my reasoning behind my earlier statement. I'm not saying that they won't change it, or aren't changing it, just that I have not seen any hint of this policy changing.

The area book is a wonderful tool, and it helps us as missionaries so much. I have yet to see a Ward Council follow up on the limited Progress Record. It is just the information they need, and if they have questions, they can ask the missionaries for more information and background. I hope this information is helpful and relevant.