Overview
After logging into the Meeting Manager, you are brought to the Home/Select Group Screen as shown in the sample below. IF you are having issues or questions about logging into the Meeting Manager, please click the following link to see the User Access section of this documentation.
Selecting a Group on the left (that you wish to work with) will display a list of Meetings for that group on the right. Select the meeting you wish to work with (make changes to or start live) OR if you wish to create a new meeting, then click the Create New Meeting link displayed above the Meeting list.
You may only have one Group, such as a City Council or County Commission, or you might have one umbrella Group with multiple sub-Groups, such as a set of committees that work in support of your main legislative body. Each of these entities will have a different configuration file that contains the names of its members and the settings or rules that the entity uses. To understand more about setting up configurations, see the Meeting SetUp section of this documentation.
While a group uses the same configuration file from meeting to meeting, each meeting follows a different agenda. In the Meeting Manager, you will create separate agendas for each meeting using the Agenda Manager and assign them to specific Meetings for future use. Basically, each meeting you see on the right hand side in the sample above is a separate Agenda. We recommend naming them with a Date in front so they sort in order nicely.
NOTE: Since most meeting agendas follow a similar format and item order, we recommend setting up an agenda TEMPLATE which can be duplicated (per the Duplicate button above) and then, renamed for each meeting of its type, and then edited to make changes for that particular meeting Agenda.
IT IS IMPORTANT that every Meeting / Agenda you set-up in the system is created HERE and present on this screen. This is how the system keeps track of all meetings and meeting results AND it is where you will find and start your live meetings when it is time.
Details / Sequence of Events
Select a Group & Meeting
Selected a Group and Meeting you wish to work with on the Home – Select Group Screen (as shown in the example screen above.
The screen below will appear. It will always “initially” display the Agenda on the right side.
Step 1 – Configuration Setup
Assuming your Configuration file for this Group seldom changes, you generally won’t change anything in this Step 1: Configuration Setup as this is usually setup for you during training by the OpenMeeting support team. Click this link Configuration Settings to view this section of the documentation.
NOTE, that in the example below, I’ve selected the TEMPLATE Agenda to start with, but I’ll likely change that to a new Agenda name as discussed more below.
Step 2 – Load Agenda
Select Save As on the left under Step 2: Load Agenda ONLY IF you wish to create a New Agenda for a new meeting. You will be given options to Name and Save the Agenda as a unique name for the new Meeting. We recommend starting the name with a date, such as “2022-01-10 Reg Brd Mtg.oma”. with a dat Template to a different name/date for this new meeting.
Select Load on the left under Step 2: Load Agenda IF the Agenda now displayed is not the one you wish to work with. A dialogue box will open showing me all other Agenda files I can choose to load and work in.
Select Edit Agenda at the top of the screen when you have the correct Agenda loaded and are ready to make your changes. To see more about editing an Agenda, click this link Agenda Manager to view this section of the documentation.
Select Create New ONLY if you wish to create a completely NEW agenda from scratch. You will be presented with a blank agenda where you will need to create all agenda items one by one. Again, click this link Agenda Manager to view this section of the documentation.
Step 3 – Load Meeting
Load Meeting is used when you have selected the Group and Meeting you are ready to actually run live. This document is mainly meant to help you name your Meetings and establish the unique Agenda for each meeting. Once you are ready to Run a Meeting, you would select the Group and Meeting on the Home Screen and select Load Meeting. To learn more about Running a Meeting, click this link Conduct Meeting – Run a Meeting.
Notes / Special Situations
If you are having issues that are not successfully addressed above, or you are not successful signing into Meeting Manager, please call OpenMeeting Customer Support at 320.249.0555. You may also review the following links for topics that may help:
