How to easily see who is out of office in M365/Outlook today
Posted by An0niempie@reddit | sysadmin | View on Reddit | 24 comments
My boss wants an easy way to see who is out of office for today (everyday he looks he want to see who is out of office today). We don't make use of Teams that much yet, so many are always offline on it, so we can't use that to see the present list.
The goals is to create an overview of who is marked out of office today and no need for the details, just the names of the unavailable people. Yes my boss really wants it and I can't get him over to not wanting it. We used to have this in our old system as well we used before we went over to M365.
I know I could manually check the Scheduling Assistant or shared calendars, but are there any other better ways? Since We don't want to make use of shared calendars and with scheduling Assistant it will be a bit of a mess with the 75+ employees we have.
Any tools or options or methods that are recommended?
simon-g@reddit
There’s a PS script here that pulls the OOF info for each user. https://admindroid.com/how-to-get-mailbox-automatic-reply-configuration-report-in-microsoft-365
You could simplify to fields needed and fire an email summary.
An0niempie@reddit (OP)
Thank you for that! This would help a bit! But the OOF info won't be there if someone is off weekly on a friday. Because they only add OOF when they go on vacation?
2drawnonward5@reddit
It feels like this is asking how to know something that hasn't been written in any system. If they're out on Friday and you need to know, they need to mark out on Friday, independent of the underlying cause.
You need to HAVE reliable data before you go USING that date.
simon-g@reddit
You can get that in a similar way using Get-MailboxCalendarConfiguration, assuming they have working days/hours set.
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/module/exchange/get-mailboxcalendarconfiguration?view=exchange-ps
nordwulf@reddit
We use a public calendar in M365/Outlook that is maintained by HR and department managers/supervisors. All time off is marked on that calendar for anyone to see.
Skyl3rRL@reddit
Have you run into any trouble maintaining this?
This is what we do and I've ran into a couple annoyances along the way. For example, the calendar view in Outlook has a 5000 item limit, so if it'll break and stop updating if the SharePoint list/calendar goes over 5000 items. We also discovered "Outlook (new)" doesn't support adding Sharepoint calendars.
nordwulf@reddit
We have it set up in Exchange under ‘Public folders’ so not in Sharepoint. Currently at 15k entries and works great. We do occasionally delete entries that are 3+ years old.
They do show up in Outlook online under ‘Other calendars’ so my guess is they will also show in the new Outlook.
Skyl3rRL@reddit
Thanks for the extra details. I'll have to check this out.
I believe the 5000 item limit is specifically a Sharepoint list threshold. The issue with "Outlook (new)" is also specifically about adding Sharepoint calendars, so if your calendar is in Exchange I imagine it's a completely separate thing and probably does work, as you say.
nordwulf@reddit
I just checked in the new Outlook and they are showing up in there as well.
Few_Juggernaut5107@reddit
You need a new boss, what a pr*CK....
RCG73@reddit
Why? I can think of several reasons right off that a manager could need this. Everything from “Sue isn’t tagged as taking off today and it’s noon and, does anyone know if she’s ok? “. To a “this task is time critical, who can I not send it to? “. Now that may not be how op’s boss uses it but the request itself is not a guarantee of malevolence
THIRSTYGNOMES@reddit
Ironically it's always managers that set their status as offline 24/7 in my experience
asm42@reddit
If you're open to a third party app, it does SSO in with M365 check out Simple In/Out
https://www.simpleinout.com/
One of our staff used it at a previous company and is pushing for it internally
libu2@reddit
There is also a Team's app that works in Windows and mobile. Makes it easy to use if you are already using Teams.
in2woods@reddit
we use it, works great. it’s a simple tool, uses geofencing for automatic tracking for in office employees.
cyclotech@reddit
Set up shifts on teams. Have users clock in. You can see who is clocked in on the shifts tab in teams if you have the permissions.
knowsshit@reddit
Maybe check if users are accessing 365 services from the office IP address within the last hours.
gregarious119@reddit
Outlook Places is brand new but has a view that could be what you’re looking for.
FlyingStarShip@reddit
Query every mailbox via powershell to check OOO status, simple
Spagman_Aus@reddit
Get an attendance system so people have to check in and check out of the office?
Khulod@reddit
It's not there because then any employee could check on anyone, which raises a privacy concern (at least in Europe with GDPR). Heck, even a manager constantly checking one of his reports' Teams absence can be a privacy concern as that's not what Teams was deployed for, I can already feel a German Works Council sharpening their knives at the very idea of managers spying on employee availability through Teams in an automated way. As others have said, tracking absence is a HR job in their dedicated systems.
Latter-Tune-9111@reddit
maybe Power Automate?
But even then, it probably won't tell you how long the OOO is, if the user has it set when they know they're coming in an hour late because of an appointment it would probably still flag.
It would be 100% easier to rely on an HR system, user puts in their leave and it generates a leave list. I can't think of a HR system that doesn't have this function.
NHarvey3DK@reddit
This is an HR problem, not IT. What about the people who don’t put an ooo on?
Baljet@reddit
This is part of any HRIS