Repo: Github – EventManager
The Problem#
When serving as the President of the Cambridge International Students’ Association (ISA), we often had to send large batches of personalised emails for events and programmes. While this was a core part of running the association, it relied on fully manual work. This required committee members to copy templates, fill in names, groups, and other details by hand, and send the emails one by one.
The problem wasn’t the amount or complexity of information or lack of organisation, but a lack of a system that properly handled it, as the information already largely existed in participant-filled forms, making automation a feasible solution.
The Solution#
To address this, I built an automation tool that ingests participant data directly from forms, constructs fully personalised emails using that data, and sends them out in parallel. It supports a wide range of use cases, from simple name-based personalisation to more complex requirements.
One example is the ISA’s annual International Families Programme, where new students (kids) are grouped with existing students (parents) to help them settle in. Previously, committee members had to manually craft the emails, including filling out each recipient’s family members and their details, which quickly became extremely error-prone and time-consuming, exacerbated by the programme’s popularity.
The Outcome#
This automation allowed the same task to be done in a matter of minutes, with very little human input. It has henceforth been used repeatedly in the association’s communications, saving time while also enabling a more consistent and professional personalised communication.
More broadly, it highlights how ubiquitous opportunities for automation are. From simpler to more complex tasks, many organisations still rely on manual processes that do not scale with growth. We have all the tools to avoid repetitive and time-consuming tasks with automation to allow people to focus on higher-impact tasks, we just have to be mindful and spot those opportunities.