How do you set up a meeting in Kronistic?
Use the New Meeting form! This form gives Kron all the information it needs to find a time that works for everyone. Then, Kron automatically pencils in a DRAFT meeting on everyone’s calendars.
What is a DRAFT meeting? How and why does Kronistic reschedule a meeting?
DRAFTs can (and do!) change times. Kron keeps an eye on everyone’s calendars. As new information gets added, Kron dynamically updates DRAFTs to respond to new meeting requests, conflicting events, or changes in availability preference. You can also update the meeting form for any of your meetings to adjust the attendee list, duration, or anything else. Kron will see it and adjust right away.
Once the meeting is finalized, Kron does not move it unless a last-minute conflict comes up for a required attendee.
Why is it better when your whole team uses Kronistic?
We’ll let you in on our secret: Kron moves DRAFT Kronistic meetings to find the best time for new Kronistic meetings. The more you use Kronistic, the more flexibility Kron has to shuffle DRAFTS and find the optimal schedule for everyone.
Imagine this: you need to meet with Pedro, Emily, and Jamal — the sooner the better. You are only available to meet in the mornings, but everyone else already has morning meetings all week. One of those morning meetings is a standing one-on-one between Emily and Pat. If all these meetings were on Kronistic, Kron could move Emily and Pat’s meeting to an afternoon time that works for them both, opening a time for your critical meeting. Kron does all of this in the background, updating everyone’s calendars automatically without taking anyone’s time or attention. No notifications, no back-and-forth emails, no nonsense.
If your whole team is using Kronistic, Kron can do superhuman feats of scheduling magic!
How do you set up a Kronistic meeting with non-Kronistic users?
You can add anyone to a Kronistic meeting by listing their email address as an attendee. Kron will send them an email inviting them to sign up.
Pro tip: If your meeting has non-Kron users listed as required attendees, Kron will wait until they sign up to schedule the meeting.
Unfortunately, if the person you invited does not sign up for Kronistic, Kron cannot schedule meetings with them. Why? Because Kron finds a time by reading everyone’s calendars directly, and Kron only has permission to read users’ calendars.
How do you add new people to Kronistic?
Inviting new users to Kronistic is easy! Simply use their email address to add them to a meeting. Kron will send them an email inviting them to sign up. Once they sign up, Kron will schedule the meeting with them.
Pro tip: if you are inviting someone new to Kronistic to a meeting and set them as a required attendee, Kron will not schedule the meeting until they sign up. But if you set them as “optional,” Kron will go ahead and schedule the DRAFT meeting right away, then update the meeting to a time that works for the new user once they sign up.
What happens if you invite someone to Kronistic and they already have an account with a different email?
The invitation email has a simple link for folks to click if they already have a Kronistic account with a different email address. Clicking this link connects the new email address as an alias of their main account.
Aliases are for emails only – not calendars. Kron will always read and write events using the main calendar of the primary Kronistic account. If you want to know how to sync calendars from multiple email accounts, see the FAQ about multiple calendar accounts below.
What are @kron events and how do you use them? What is the kalendar?
When you sign up for Kronistic, you set your general availability for meetings. Kron uses that information to create a new synced Google calendar called your “kalendar.” Kron populates your kalendar with @kron events to keep track of your availability. The kalendar is yours to edit directly in Google calendar. Please update it to let kron know if your availability changes! If you don’t like the separate kalendar, no problem — you can write @kron events to any synced calendar.
Any time you tag “@kron” in the title or description of a calendar event, that lets Kronistic know that you want Kron to check for information about your availability.
What are “if needed” times and how do you use them?
In your kalendar (or any synced calendar), put “@kron available if needed” in the title or description of an event to let Kron know about blocks of time that are possible but not ideal for your meetings. You can say “@kron available if really needed” or even “@kron available if really really needed” to add even more protection to those times without closing them off entirely. Kron will do its best to protect your “if needed” times, only using them to schedule meetings that otherwise would be impossible to fit in.
What are Groups and how do you use them?
A “Group” is a list of Kronistic users that you want to put together in a single category for scheduling purposes.
For example, you might make one group called “Myteam” for the people on your work team. Then you make another Group called “Company” for all the people at your company (including your team). Then you make a third Group called “Friends” for your personal friends, which may or may not include anyone in your “Myteam” and “Company” groups.
To create, edit, or delete a Group, go to the Groups section of your Kronistic Profile. You can create as many Groups as you want and add anyone you know to them. There are two things you can do with Groups:
- Set different availability for different Groups (more details in the FAQ section below)
- Add everyone in the Group as attendees to a new meeting form
How do you set different availability for different Groups?
Use @kron events to set different availability for different Groups or even specific people. Just like with “if needed” availability, simply update the title of your @kron event like this: “@kron available for Group” or “@kron available for colleague@company.com”
For a particular block of time, you can add as much information about your level of availability for as many groups as you want. For example, you could set your morning availability to: “@kron available for Group, available if needed for colleague@company.com, available if really really needed for everyone”. Or, you could make three separate @kron events at the same time. Use whatever works best for you!
For example, let’s say you make 3 groups: “Myteam,” “Company,” and “Friends.” You want to be available to meet with “Myteam” any time during business hours and with the “Company” during mornings only. You decide that during the lunch hour (12pm – 1pm), you would do a work meeting if needed but prefer to meet with “Friends”. And after 5pm, it’s “Friends” only.
Kron can handle it. You could set up your @kron events like this:
For this to work, make sure that the name of the Group in your @kron event matches the Group name in your Kronistic profile.
How do you make sure that meetings are scheduled during times that are actually free?
Kron uses your synced calendars to check when you are available for Kronistic meetings. For this to work, you need to:
- Sync all your relevant calendars
- Keep you calendars up-to-date
Sync all your relevant calendars
Kron checks synced calendars for two things: @kron events (which tell Kron what times to use) and busy events (which tell Kron what times to avoid). By default, Kronistic is synced with two calendars: your primary Google calendar and the kalendar that Kron created for you.
To sync new calendars, go to the Calendars section of your Kronistic Profile and click “Add a Calendar.” You will see a drop-down menu that shows all the calendars associated with your Google account. If you want to sync calendars from other accounts, please read the FAQ below about managing multiple accounts.
Keep your calendars up-to-date
As long as you remember to keep your calendar up-to-date, Kron will make sure that your Kronistic meetings integrate seamlessly with your busy life.
When Kron reads your synced calendars, Kron treats every busy event as sacrosanct. Kron schedules around them. Kron cannot move events in your calendar unless they are Kronistic DRAFT meetings.
Did something come up that conflicts with a DRAFT meeting? Just add the new event to your synced calendar. Kron will see the conflict and move the DRAFT Kronistic meeting shortly.
What if there is no possible time that works for your requested meeting?
This is rare but it does happen. Kron will move the meeting to the “Unscheduled” section of your My Meetings page and ping the required attendees to let them know the meeting could not be scheduled, with a link to a help page for that meeting.
The unscheduled meeting help page tells you what the scheduling problem is. This can help attendees coordinate and figure out if any changes can be made to make the meeting possible to schedule. And you can always edit the meeting request to change the time window, duration, or attendees.
Can you make changes to a meeting after submitting a meeting request?
Yes, you can make any changes while the meeting is in the DRAFT stage. Simply update the meeting request form. You can find a direct link to the request form for your meeting in the event description in your calendar or on the My Meetings page in Kronistic.
Can you edit or delete Kronistic meetings directly in your calendar?
Updating the Google calendar events will not work. Check the Google calendar event description for a link to that specific event’s Kronistic Meeting Page, and you can make any edits you need from there.
Can Kron move meetings that weren’t scheduled in Kronistic?
No. Kron only moves Kronistic DRAFT meetings. Kron cannot move or adjust events that you input directly into your calendar(s). Kron treats these events as immovable conflicts and always schedule around them.
You have multiple calendar accounts and…
You want Kron to read your other calendars to know when you’re busy — how do you do that?
Use Google calendar’s subscription feature to add calendars from other accounts. Once you subscribe to a calendar, it becomes available to sync with your Kronistic account.
You can also share Outlook calendars and iCal calendars with Google using the subscription feature.
Once you have subscribed to all the relevant calendars, go to your Kronistic Profile and go to the Calendars section to sync them with Kronistic.
You want to be able to see your Kronistic meetings on calendars from multiple accounts — how do you do that?
Kron writes Kronistic meetings on the main calendar of your primary Kronistic account email. From there, you can use your calendar client’s subscription and sharing features to view Kronistic meetings from other accounts.
Which account should you use for your Kronistic account?
We recommend that you use the Google calendar account that you check and update most frequently. If you actively maintain multiple accounts, choose the account for whichever calendar needs automatic scheduling the most.
Who do you contact if you have more questions?
Email help@kronistic.com to contact a human member of the Kronistic team. We welcome user questions, feedback, bug reports, and any other comments.