Do you want to sync your Coworks bookings and events with an Outlook Calendar?
The Outlook and Coworks integration will push your Coworks bookings and events onto an Outlook Calendar and keep them in sync to any updates/deletions to those bookings in Coworks.
This integration will keep a shared Outlook Calendar up to date with Coworks bookings for:
Using Outlook's "Resource Rooms/Equipment" feature while keeping Coworks in sync with those bookings.
Using a conference tablet that syncs with Outlook. That calendar will remain effective in showing the status of that room from Coworks.
Using a booking aggregator platform that syncs with Outlook (Liquid Space etc.). New bookings from the aggregator will not occur during times that have already been booked via Coworks.
Sharing a public Outlook Calendar of events or bookings on your site or with your members/staff. The calendar will have an accurate representation of Coworks bookings.
How to set up the Outlook integration
Authenticating your account
Connect your Outlook Calendar by clicking the Community tab and then selecting "Integrations," or by clicking here. Under "Outlook Calendar," click the "Connect" button.
Sign in to your Microsoft Outlook account.
IMPORTANT: Please make sure the account you're using to sign with has access to the appropriate calendars, rooms, and resources in Outlook. Otherwise, you will not be able to properly sync those in Coworks.
Grant Coworks access.
Click the "Settings" option under Outlook Calendar.
Toggle the settings on and click the "Save" button.
Automatically Push Bookings - this will control the automatic push of bookings made via mobile apps or dashboard. If turned off, the Coworks/Outlook Calendar integration will not work.
Default Push Events Setting for Calendar Form - when scheduling an event from the dashboard, this toggle will keep the default setting to push events. If turned off, you will need to manually choose to sync each event.
Connecting Coworks Rooms to Outlook
Now that your account is connected, the next step is to connect each Room in Coworks to the corresponding room or calendar in Outlook
If using Microsoft's Resource Rooms/Equipment feature please follow the steps below. Otherwise, proceed to "Linking Coworks Rooms"
Log in to your MS Admin account. Navigate to the "Rooms & equipment" tab located in the Resources section of your admin account.
For each room/equipment, be sure to add the user you used to authenticate the integration as a "Delegate" for that room. This ensures the user has appropriate access to accept bookings.
Navigate to your Outlook Calendar. You need to make sure all of the Rooms/equipment calendars have been added to your account under "My Calendars." To do this, click on "Add Calendar."
Choose "Add from directory." Choose your account from above. From there, add all of the rooms/equipment.
When done, all of the rooms/equipment should be visible under the "My Calendar" section. You're now ready to link these to Coworks.
Linking Coworks Rooms
Set up each room in your space to sync to the Outlook Calendar by going to the Rooms tab or clicking here.
For each room, click "View," click "Edit," and scroll down to the bottom to choose the Outlook Calendar each room will push bookings to. This will now sync all bookings to this room made in Coworks to the associated Outlook Calendar. Please make sure the names of the calendars match the name in Outlook exactly.
Repeat for each Room, Hot Desk, Space, and Equipment in your community that you wish to sync to a specific calendar.
Managers can also choose which calendar to push to when manually creating bookings/events. Make some test bookings and events so you can see how they appear on your Coworks Calendar and Outlook Calendar.
2-Way Sync
With our 2-way sync "Pull" capability, you can automatically update Coworks bookings when a person books or creates directly in Outlook.
Check out this article for a walkthrough of how to set up the 2-way sync capability for Outlook.
Note: When setting up the 2-way sync for the Outlook Calendar integration, your existing meetings in Outlook Calendar will not be automatically added into Coworks.
If you'd like us to import these meetings into Coworks, just let us know!
Warning: Please note that booking directly in the Outlook Calendar may lead to conflicts in Coworks because Outlook will not block or perform conflict checks on calendars by default.
If you have any questions, be sure to reach out by chatting with us on the bottom right corner of your screen!
Happy Coworking!