TOPIC:

Currently, to handle the situation of having guest speakers on the agenda, my club created a dummy account called 'Guest' and which is tied to the club's email address, and then the agenda preparer (like the VPE) is then able to select 'Guest' in the dropdown for a role.  What might be an alternative to this issue is that 'Guest' is built in as an option in the dropdown list of members in agenda roles without having to create a dummy account for it to show up, or otherwise once the agenda preparer selects 'Guest', there is some functionality to allow the preparer to type in a specific guest's name.  Certainly allowing the addition of a guest's actual name would be something that's not doable with a dummy account called 'Guest'.  Hopefully this idea can be implemented.  Much appreciate it!

I manage the FTH website for 3 of my 4 Toastmasters clubs.  The need to assign a meeting role to a guest is a very frequent requirement, and from all I've been able to gather, there's currently no way to do it.  We need to be able to list a guest as a speaker or any other meeting role.  We typically have the Area Director fill a role when they make their club visit.  I currently (as in this week) need to list a guest speaker at 2 of my clubs.  The inability to do this impacts the professional appearance of the agenda, which impacts club image.
Couldn't you just include people listed in the Guest membership list as well as the Member membership list in the dropdown for meeting roles.  If you're concerned about the privacy requirements, people added to the Guest membership list are already subjected to the Opt-In requirement.
Please???

FTH cannot be subject to the opt-in/privacy compliance issues of storing names & contact information for non-members.

What might be an alternative to this issue is that 'Guest' is built in as an option in the dropdown list of members in agenda roles without having to create a dummy account for it to show up, or otherwise once the agenda preparer selects 'Guest'

We can explore ideas for more effectively utilizing tools and methods to show roles being filled by a title (e.g. Guest) and not someone's name.

The need to assign a meeting role to a guest is a very frequent requirement, and from all I've been able to gather, there's currently no way to do it. 

Is your club utilizing the strategy mentioned in the original message in this thread? Create a club member named 'Guest'. We've seen clubs do this with multiple dummy accounts for various club-function roles. You could also have dummy accounts called 'Area Director', 'Contest Judge', etc.

A tip for using dummy accounts; enclosing the name in braces {Guest} will force it to the bottom of the member list in the drop-downs and private member directory.

The "Guests" are not necessarily members of Toastmasters International and have not signed the membership form and are not bound by that document.

We will not be adding non-members to the agenda.

A guest would typically be introduced by a member... the guest could be thought of as the topic of the member in the drop down... saves making dummy accounts and allows for anything the guest wants included in the agenda - and gives a member a chance to practice introducing a guest? I'm new and could be way off base but anyways, that's my 2c.

Based on the new posts I see, I think a new functionality could be having these titles appear in the dropdown at the bottom without having the VPE/admin create dummy accounts every time.  These titles can be 'Area Director', 'Division Director', 'District Director', 'District Official', 'Contest Judge', 'Guest', etc.  Perhaps the admin can choose from a list in the settings as to which titles show up in the dropdown, e.g., in Meeting Agenda Settings --> Global Settings, there is a list of titles (maybe there are 10 titles), but the admin only wants 1 or 2 of them (let's say 'Guest' and 'Area Director') to show up in the agenda dropdown, so the admin just chooses those 2 rather than have an extra 10 titles show up after the members' names.

Or instead of it being managed in Global Settings, another possibility is to have 'Guest' in the bottom of the agenda role dropdown, and when the admin chooses 'Guest', then there appears a list of titles to choose from, like 'Area Director', 'Contest Judge', 'Guest 1', 'Guest 2', 'Guest 3', and just plain 'Guest'.

(A guest would not simply be able to choose at will what to present at the meeting.  It would be within the structure of the meeting, whether as a guest speaker, ah-counter, general evaluator, etc.  A guest might be introduced by a member during introductions, but this would be within a segment normally conducted by the Toastmaster for introductions of all attendees of the meeting, i.e., it's within the existing structure of a meeting.)

Basically, these implementation options would
(1) recognize that there are guests who may agree to take on roles in advance (whether they request to come or they are invited);
(2) recognize that there may be different titles a club may specify for the guest and so give the admin a choice;
(3) avoid the guest's actual name being in the agenda because of privacy issues, since they didn't sign the membership form (as for guests opting in, my club does not add new names to the Guest membership list anymore because we believe it could be too onerous for a guest to opt in, and further the opt-in is only to receive emails and is not for inclusion in the agenda); and
(4) preclude the need to create a dummy account for each title.

Hopefully, something can be implemented, but in the meantime, having a dummy account has the benefit of being able to list it as an email contact for the web contact form, which, by the way...

Is it possible to have Web Administrator and/or a club email address as one of the Club Contacts in the 'Contact Us' form?  Right now, I select 'Guest' as a Club Contact because the email address associated with the dummy account is actually the club's email address (and it's the same address used for the web admin too).

Thanks so much!

One idea per post or it will get lost.