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Publish company events and holidays to Outlook - without invitation noise.

Manage a source event once and distribute it to selected Outlook calendars without asking every employee to accept a meeting invite.

The asterisk is the trigger. Create one item in a group calendar and include an asterisk (*) in the subject. Exchange Group Calendar copies that item to the personal Outlook calendars of the users who are members of that group calendar.

Why this is useful

Not every company event needs to be sent as a meeting invitation. For holidays, company events, internal deadlines or general office dates, you may simply want the item to appear in the Outlook calendars of the right people.

Exchange Group Calendar makes this possible by using a central group calendar as the source. An administrator creates or edits one item in that group calendar, and EGC distributes it to the personal calendars of the selected users.

How the asterisk trigger works

To push an event or holiday to users’ personal calendars, create the item in the relevant group calendar and add an asterisk to the subject line. On most keyboards, you type an asterisk with Shift + 8.

Example subject:

* Company holiday

When EGC detects the asterisk in the subject, it copies that item to all Outlook users who are members of that particular group calendar.

Push an item to selected users only

Sometimes an item should not go to every member of the group calendar. EGC can target one or more specific users by using the unique part of each user's email address.

Items copied from users to the group calendar are shown with that unique name in brackets. For example, appointments from jimR@company.com appear in the group calendar as [JimR] Item subject.

To push a new item to only two users, create the item in the group calendar and start the subject with the user codes between hash signs, separated by a pipe character:

#JimR|JohnV# Item subject

For three users, add another pipe-separated name, for example #JimR|JohnV|JaneD# Item subject. For one user, use #JimR# Item subject.

Only one source item to maintain

Even though multiple users see the published event or holiday in their own Outlook calendar, only one source item is visible in the group calendar. If the organizer changes or deletes that source item, the change is replicated to the members of that group calendar.

If a new user joins the team later and is added as a member of the group calendar, the event can be published to that user’s calendar as well.

Basic setup

• Create a group calendar in the GCADMIN console.
• Add users by typing their email address, selecting them from the Global Address List, or selecting a distribution list.
• Select the users and the group calendar, then click Make member.
• In the permissions section, select at least one administrator who is allowed to create the * items.
• Create the event or holiday item in the group calendar and include * in the subject.

Dedicated calendars for events or holidays

Although it is not required, it is often useful to create separate group calendars for company events, public holidays or internal office dates. Because users can be members of multiple group calendars, this gives you a clear structure for different types of calendar items.

By using filters on other group calendars, you can prevent holidays and general events from appearing in calendars where they are not needed. This keeps the calendars focused and avoids unnecessary noise.

Holiday and leave request approval

A holiday calendar can also be used with a moderator. In that setup, users create holiday requests in their own Outlook calendar. Exchange Group Calendar sends the request to the HR person or another responsible reviewer, and the result is posted back to the item in the user’s calendar.