Tag: shift swapping

Posted on

Shift Swap Form: free template + 5 need to knows (2023)

Oil painting of two astronauts high fiving

Summary

  • Request and record shift swaps with a printable, free template

  • Make your shift swapping process more efficient and compliant by considering labor costs, schedule validations, and a bidding process

  • Manage employee shift swaps more efficiently with shift swapping software

Without the right documentation and protocol, letting your staff swap shifts can get a little messy. That’s probably why you are here, right?

Don’t worry; we’ve got you covered with this free template with fillable fields:

Shift Swap Request Form Template

Go ahead and make a copy, save it, print it, fold it, roll it – hell, you can even turn it into a paper airplane if you feel so inclined.

But hey, while you’re here, you might want to check out a few ways to improve the shift-swapping process at your business.

Five considerations for shift swaps

Allowing employees to swap their shifts can be as simple as a text message followed by a minor edit to the schedule. But a process as simple as this can run into problems, especially when you have a staff count over, say five. So here are a few ways to make shift swaps not only more efficient but cost-effective and compliant as well.

1. Allow for a bidding process

Sometimes, 1-to-1 shift swaps aren’t practical or efficient. Especially with larger workforces, singling out one coworker for a swap request misses out on potentially better-fit replacements.

As an alternative, consider letting staff members submit general swap requests, which anyone on their team can offer to cover. Managers can review the submissions, see all the bids, and decide on the most sensible swap. Using a bidding process like this eliminates the need for staff to hunt down a single person to swap with, and it allows for better collaboration and communication across your workforce.

Bidding processes also allow you to offer open shifts to your staff in case of last-minute call-outs or no-shows.

Webinar: How to Reduce No Call, No Shows

2. Don’t overlook qualifications & clashes

Whether you use 1-to-1 swaps or a bidding process, there is always a chance the wrong employee swaps in for another. Without proper oversight, you could have an unqualified employee taking a shift that requires special certification; this could land you in some hot water. You could also let a trade go through that accidentally clashes with an employee’s preexisting shift, leaving you with a broken schedule.

Make sure all shift swaps go through a schedule validation process to avoid these issues. Managers need an easy and immediate way to see missing qualifications and shift clashes; otherwise, they will slip through the cracks eventually.

3. Stay compliant with labor laws

Staying with the theme of schedule validations, it’s essential to know if a shift swap will violate any labor laws that apply to your workforce. For instance, if a swap puts someone over their maximum hours for the week or gives them a dreaded “clopening” shift, your organization could risk legal repercussions. Ensure the validation process catches these hazards before the DOL comes knocking.

4. Shift costs aren’t created equal

Once all compliance validations are accounted for, you should consider your labor costs. Ideally, you want to prevent shift swaps from costing you more. For instance, if a trade causes one employee to edge into overtime because their requested new shift is longer than their current one, you’ll be paying overtime rates that previously were never scheduled. Not great.

It’s a good idea to include wage costs, hourly rates, and work-hour totals on shift swap requests. Managers should be able to tell at a glance whether or not approving a trade will incur higher labor costs. This is where a bidding process comes in handy; managers can approve even swaps that result in no change to expected wage costs for the pay period.

5. Utilize the supercomputers in your employees’ pockets

Accounting for all the things above might seem like a lot of work – and it is if you are using paper shift swap forms. While you’ll technically have documentation of your swaps, you’ll have no real idea if you are doing them efficiently or compliantly. Luckily for you, there is a high likelihood that each of your employees has a supercomputer in their pocket at all times. Use them.

These days, employee scheduling apps come with real-time shift swapping functionality that makes shift change forms obsolete. Incorporating the modern-day extension of the human body into a workflow like shift swapping only makes sense, especially in fast-paced environments like hospitality and nursing. Shift changes take less time and are easier to manage when you condense all the admin work into a single, easy-to-use app.

Ditch the template: let the software do the work

A paper shift switch form – even ours – will not cut it if you want to manage shift swaps correctly. With Workforce.com’s shift swapping software, you can automatically validate every trade request for qualifications, maximum hours, employee availability, shift clashes, and overtime.

Shift swap requests on the Workforce.com app

Once approved, everyone gets notified over the app, and the work schedule is automatically updated accordingly. Sounds nice, right?

Leave the templates behind and get started with smarter shift swapping by contacting us today.

Posted on

4 proven steps for tackling employee absenteeism

Summary

  • Identifying the cause of employee absenteeism not only helps uncover deeper-rooted issues — More

  • Establishing an employee attendance policy promotes transparency across your company — More

  • Keeping your employees engaged makes them more likely to be productive and present at work — More

  • Implementing a scheduling process that is reliable and flexible will tackle a number of issues that would otherwise increase the likelihood of employee absenteeism. — More

A common yet highly disruptive issue any business owner or human resources professional has to deal with is employee absenteeism. This sort of employee absence refers to unscheduled absences beyond what is acceptable and planned within a company’s policy. Acceptable absences include things like paid time off (PTO), sick leave, or unpaid time off someone might take as part of the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA).

Having regularly absent employees results in lost productivity, as unplanned absences create extra pressure and more work for other team members. This extra work could lead to burnout. The causes of excessive absenteeism can also be indicative of deep-rooted issues, such as low employee morale or a toxic work environment. 

Employee absenteeism is a perennial problem, but it is particularly damaging in the shift-based service industries. According to the most recent figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, service industries have the highest absenteeism rate in the US economy. Workforce.com’s own research backs this up. In our 2021 survey, 31% of businesses listed disruption to shifts caused by employee absenteeism as one of their biggest problems.

With the right tools and data in hand, managers can reduce employee absenteeism as well as identify and tackle its underlying causes.  

1. Identify why employees are frequently absent

Your business is a complicated machine. Just as you wouldn’t try to fix a problem with your car or computer by randomly replacing parts, you can’t successfully address persistent absenteeism in your company without knowing where the problem is.

Using employee scheduling software can tie together all of your shift schedules and time clock information. This joined-up approach allows you to query that data in order to spot the patterns of absenteeism and identify the who, where, and when of the problem.

Identifying the frequent trouble spots is important as the root causes of absenteeism can occur at different organizational levels.

  • Specific staff members: If a particular employee is persistently missing workdays, it’s worth checking if there is a valid reason. There may be problems that can be addressed without escalating to disciplinary action.
  • Specific shifts: If you find that absenteeism is a recurring issue only on certain shifts, it could be a problem with a particular shift leader or similar personnel issues that are making employees avoid that shift.
  • Specific locations: If you see red flags for absenteeism at a particular outlet or office, this may be a sign of managerial problems at that location. It could be an indication of something more sinister such as workplace bullying or workplace harassment. There could also be a local or geographical context — is that location particularly hard to reach on public transport?

Now that you know more about the source of your employee absenteeism, you can start addressing it.

2. Establish a clear employee attendance policy

Absences have immediate financial costs for a business. Absences related to mental health issues alone results in a $47.6 billion annual loss to the US economy through lost productivity. There should, therefore, be no ambiguity over attendance.

Employees will always require sick days or will be unable to work due to personal issues. Regardless, they should know what is required of them in such cases through a clearly defined absenteeism policy. This way, they are also aware of the disciplinary procedure that will kick in should they not meet their end of the agreement.

Your company needs a clear and accessible employee attendance policy. A good attendance policy should include:

  • How much notice employees must give if they can’t come in
  • What absence rate or number of absences is considered unacceptable
  • How many days of “no-call” or unexcused absences will be considered grounds for immediate dismissal

When considering attendance data with regard to employee absenteeism, it is especially important to take absence frequency into account rather than just how many days were missed. Ten days of absence in a row caused by a serious illness tells a very different story than 10 days of last-minute absences spread across the year that always fall on Mondays, for instance.

3. Implement incentives like employee wellness programs

Increased workloads and burnout are major contributors to low morale and absenteeism. Therefore, looking out for your employees’ physical and mental well-being has long-term benefits for them as well as your bottom line. 

Implementing employee wellness programs is a great way to achieve this. Such programs promote and encourage your employees to maintain good physical and mental health. 

A wellness program can take on many different forms. Some common examples include:

  • Installing fitness centers at your offices — this might be trickier for small businesses. If you have the space and resources, it’s a great way to help your team stay in shape.
  • Commuting incentives — encouraging your staff members to get to work on foot or by bicycle instead of using their cars keeps them and the environment healthy.
  • Covering expenses for things like gym membership, yoga classes, or even sports equipment.   

4. Create a reliable and collaborative scheduling procedure

Unhappy employees become disengaged and prone to excessive absences, and erratic work schedules are frequent causes of this disconnect. Creating reliable and predictable shifts gives workers more control over their work-life balance and allows them to plan their time with less stress. Research makes the connection clear: lower employee engagement results in increased employee absenteeism.

Implement predictive scheduling

Investing in predictive scheduling will not be optional for companies operating in certain US states and cities. Predictive scheduling laws are already on the books in Vermont, Oregon, San Francisco, Berkeley, Emeryville, San Jose, Seattle, New York, Chicago, and Philadelphia. Eight states have pending legislation on the subject.

Whether you are legally obliged to implement such a system or not, it’s worth adopting the most common aspects of predictive scheduling:

  • Changes to schedules should be communicated well in advance.
  • Employees should have sufficient rest between shifts — between nine and 11 hours.
  • Avoid the practice of “clopening,” where the same employee closes up at night and reopens the next morning.
  • Offer available shifts to current employees before taking on temporary staff.

Following these basic rules will encourage a more engaged, happy, and loyal workforce and reduce employee absenteeism.

Offer collaborative scheduling

Absenteeism can also be a sign that employees are unable to work the shifts they’ve been assigned. One way around this is to give employees the ability to have more say in which shifts they work or even swap shifts with colleagues. Allowing this involvement in the scheduling process helps employees fit work around their other commitments.

Not only does this collaboration remove one of the common excuses for missing work or tardiness, but research also supports the idea that offering employees more control over when they work directly addresses the causes of employee absenteeism. A study by Future Forum shows how workplace flexibility means employees are more productive and more connected to their workplace culture. 

There are two methods of introducing more collaborative scheduling to your company — shift bids and shift swaps. With shift bids, the manager puts out a list of the shifts that need to be filled, employees bid to be assigned the ones most convenient to them, and then the manager makes the final choice from those who put themselves forward. With shift swaps, workers are able to trade shifts on an ad-hoc basis while the manager signs off on the swaps to ensure full staff coverage is maintained. In both cases, employees get more control over when they work without undermining the manager’s authority.

The prospect of changing the way your shifts are assigned can seem daunting, but employee scheduling software such as Workforce.com has features to streamline the process for easy implementation.

Employee absenteeism is your alarm call

A high level of employee absenteeism is a sign that something isn’t working in your business. Consider it a warning that staff morale is low, and there are scheduling and managerial issues that need to be addressed to stem the tide. Data from your employee scheduling software will identify these pain points, and the responses listed above will tackle not just the symptoms of absenteeism but the cause as well. Seize the opportunity to make your business work better, and you’ll not only solve your immediate absence problems but also create a happier, more engaged workforce for long-term benefits.

Posted on

How to develop a call-out policy that reduces business impact

Abstract art of man in apron on cellphone

Summary

  • Practice compassion and consistency when handling call-outs and disciplinary action

  • Clearly communicate call-out policy across your workforce so staff and managers are on the same page

  • Streamline the call-out process with mobile-first scheduling 

Picture this: You’re looking at the clock. It’s 10 minutes before your employee is scheduled to come in for their shift — and, suddenly, your phone rings. It’s your employee calling to say something urgent came up, and they won’t be able to work. All your other team members have already requested the night off.

These kinds of scenarios put managers and supervisors in a dilemma. No business wants to operate understaffed, especially with a last-minute notice, but emergencies do sometimes happen.

Striking a balance between keeping your business running smoothly and letting employees call out when they really need to can be difficult. It’s important to have a call-out policy in place, so your entire team understands when it’s appropriate to call out and how to do so in a way that helps the business work around their absences.

Create a clear and comprehensive call-out policy

Your call-out policy should clarify everything that your team needs to know about calling out so that there’s no room for misunderstanding what’s allowed and what’s not. Putting your policies and procedures into words builds accountability and sets clear expectations on what employees need to do in order to call out. Including these five elements ensures that your call-out policy covers everything your employees need to know:

  1. Definitions: Define “call out” – specifically, an employee informing you that they’re unable to work their scheduled shift as planned. Define tardiness vs. absence — someone calling to say they’ll be late versus not working at all. You should also clarify the difference between excused and unexcused absences and what criteria you use to excuse absences. For example, absences due to medical or family emergencies should be excused, but call-outs without notice and a legitimate reason should not. 
  2. Deadlines: What is the latest time before their shift that an employee can call out in order to be excused from work? You might ask employees to call out at least eight hours before their shift starts to receive an excused absence without reason, or they can call out at any time if it’s a valid emergency.
  3. Procedure: Explain how employees should submit a formal call-out request – via phone call, email, text message, or app. Who is responsible for getting their shift covered – the employee or management? Does an employee who calls out need to follow up and provide documentation or proof, like a signed doctor’s note?
  4. Records: Explain how you track attendance and shift changes across your team for visibility – for example, timekeeping and scheduling software, paper timecards, or a retail point-of-sale system.
  5. Consequences: Describe what circumstances require disciplinary action, like reaching a certain number of absences, and what penalties employees may receive. Set a limit on unexcused absences and how many will be considered job abandonment.

Keep your call-out policy simple and easy to comprehend using simple language instead of legal jargon. Walk through all of your procedures clearly, including visual how-to guides if necessary, so that employees know exactly how to call out of work while following company policy.

Treat your employees with compassion

Nobody wants to call out if it means they’ll lose their job, even if they need to call out. But you also don’t want employees fighting through hazardous weather to come to work or struggling with a personal health matter while trying to be productive. Exercising compassion and empathy puts support structures in place so that your employees can call out of work when they need to while still following the policy. 

The key to a compassionate call-out procedure is to offer flexibility as long as employees give notice as soon as possible and can provide a good reason for their absence. Include specific wording in your documentation that allows you to excuse absences for additional reasons outside of those explicitly given in your policy.

An employee experiencing a medical emergency or car trouble right before their shift might choose a “no call, no show” if they know that they won’t be excused from work for calling out too late. But if you’re willing to excuse call-outs in these extenuating circumstances, that employee would make sure you knew why they weren’t able to show up. This lets you plan around their absence more effectively because you know about it before the fact instead of after it has already happened.

Your call-out policy should prioritize your employees’ well-being and build mutual respect for both company and employee time. Give employees a certain number of sick days or personal days that they can use to call out of work at their discretion. Tell employees that you’d prefer them to be safe and call out of work than to come in under less-than-ideal circumstances. 

Create a company culture that encourages employees to communicate their needs and put themselves first. In turn, you’ll have a workforce that has more trust in their management and communicates in a timely, transparent manner when they need to take a day off.

Apply disciplinary action fairly and consistently

There’s a fine line between using disciplinary action to assign accountability and using it to punish your employees. The difference comes down to how fair the consequences are and how consistently the rules are applied.

Whatever consequences employees receive should be proportionate to how disruptive their absences are to the business. Employees who frequently call out at the last minute without a justified reason should receive more scrutiny than those who only call out once every few months. Similarly, an unexcused, no-call, no-show absence is more serious than an employee who calls out and gets their shift covered by a co-worker.

Every employee’s situation is unique, so it can be difficult to apply the rules fairly across all circumstances. An attendance point system can remove bias from attendance tracking. With a point system, employees might accrue a certain number of points for excused absences and more for unexcused absences. These points can expire or be removed from employee records over time, ensuring that only employees who excessively miss work or call out late are flagged for disciplinary action. 

Whenever you discipline employees, make sure that those consequences are justified, backed up with evidence of unexcused absences and call-outs. Don’t display favoritism toward employees with higher seniority or longer tenure; all employees should respect the company’s call-out policy equally.

Educate employees on your call-out policy

You can’t expect employees to comply with rules if they don’t even know what those rules are. That’s why it’s important to make sure your workers understand your call-out policy well before you expect them to follow it.

Make sure that all company policies are available and readily accessible to employees. Post your call-out policy on a staff bulletin board and send it to all employees via email. Add it to your employee handbook, and then ensure that all workers have a copy. Remind employees frequently about your call-out policy, especially during time periods when they’re more likely to take time off, like a holiday, spring break, or flu season.

Ensure that all managers understand the call-out policy thoroughly so that they can accurately answer any questions from their team members. Hold training sessions as necessary for managers on your call-out policy. Go over the difference between excused and unexcused absences, what kind of disciplinary actions are appropriate, and how to document call-outs. Educating both your managers and employees so that everyone knows what’s expected of them makes your call-out policy more likely to succeed. 

Fill call-outs faster with the right tools

In an ideal world, employees would never need to call out, but in reality, things happen. Put tools and policies in place to help you expect the unexpected and navigate unforeseen circumstances with ease. The right scheduling solutions can help automate the process of backfilling call-outs, proactively reducing the impact absenteeism has on your bottom line.

Workforce.com empowers both managers and workers to deal with call-outs efficiently while staying in close communication throughout the process. Shift swaps enable employees to take ownership of calling out. Meanwhile, managers have the option to reassign shifts, offer shift bids, or even remove them if no coverage is available.

If you’re in HR and having a hard time enforcing an efficient call-out policy, here’s what you can do to back control.

For more info, go ahead and contact one of our workforce management pros today.

Posted on

Simple shift replacement: A home run for the Lake Elsinore Storm

Summary

  • Last-minute schedule changes are difficult to manage without the right technology

  • Modern workforce management solutions make shift replacements easy

  • Minor league baseball team the Lake Elsinore Storm use Workforce.com’s shift replacement tool constantly

Uh oh, looks like Last Minute Linus can’t make it to his prep cook shift tonight. To make matters worse, it is a Friday – the busiest night of the week. Someone needs to cover his shift. So begins the feverish process of cold calling and texting dozens of employees to find a shift replacement. Sounds familiar, right?

If so, that’s a problem. There is simply no reason to overcomplicate replacing employee shifts. However, many in the hospitality industry are doing just this.

Businesses struggling with schedule changes

According to a study from earlier this year, 69% of schedules are made on paper or word processors. Because of this, navigating scheduling logistics is taking far too long. About 29% of employers say approving schedule changes and shift swaps takes the most time in the scheduling process. When dealing with shift replacements, 75% of managers claim to only call, text, or email employees to communicate. 

Combing through your phone and email contact lists like this takes valuable time, as does manually updating schedules with every last-minute change. 

Fortunately, there is an easier way to orchestrate all of this. 

Easy shift swapping

Workforce.com facilitates easy shift replacements all in one place for every employee and manager to see. No more texting seven different people to figure out who can cover who. Right from their phone, an employee can signal a need for a shift swap; this sends a notification to all their team members. These team members can then view information about the available shift and decide for themselves if they will claim it or not. Once a swap happens, all a manager needs to do is review and approve it with one click. Boom. It’s that easy.

Also Read: Shift swap software empowers managers and employees to take charge of scheduling

Utilizing efficient shift replacement technology benefits both employers and employees. According to a whitepaper published by Workforce.com, shift replacement tools empower managers to reduce overtime and lower under/overstaffing. For employees, the technology provides a better work/life balance as well as the ability to build camaraderie through more effective communication.

Time savings in Minor League Baseball

Many businesses know firsthand the positive impact shift replacement software has on their scheduling efficiency. Recently, we reached out to the Lake Elsinore Storm, a minor league baseball affiliate of the San Diego Padres, to hear about their experience using Workforce.com. 


“One of my favorite features is the shift replacement feature where I can see who’s not available for a shift and who is available to pick it up and don’t have to worry about reaching out to people,” says Katie, an HR generalist for the team. The Storm has a heavy emphasis on hospitality, employing a staff of over for a variety of roles encompassing restaurant service, ticketing, concessions, and groundskeeping. 

Before implementing the software, Katie found that personally overseeing shift replacements was eating up a lot of her time. This has since changed with the switch to Workforce.com: “I don’t have to worry about reaching out to people last minute, getting on the phone, sending emails. I know that it just shows up on someone’s phone and they can pick it up.”

Right there lies the real beauty of Workforce.com’s shift replacement feature; it empowers employees with the ability to take part in the scheduling process. Through this empowerment, unnecessary work is offloaded from the manager directly to the employee, saving time and money while maximizing convenience.

For Lake Elsinore Storm, the time savings brought about by key features such as shift replacement were well recognized across upper management. “It’s almost like we have another assistant or another employee working with us that is really intelligent and smart and knows what it’s doing … it’s really a time-saver,” states Christine Kavic, the Storm’s CFO.

The Storm have many different employee teams set up on Workforce.com, each serving different areas of hospitality. From the taproom staff to stadium maintenance crew, all teams work in unison to make game days go smoothly. Because of this variety, Lake Elsinore Storm management understands more than most what it takes to efficiently schedule a workforce in the hospitality industry. A result of this is high customer satisfaction through exceptional service to the public – something the team prioritizes. 

“Without Workforce.com, we could not do what we do best, and that is entertain the community,” says Kavic. 

Experience it for yourself

Replacing shifts shouldn’t be a hassle; in fact, it should be the easiest part of scheduling. Since Workforce.com’s shift replacement tool has been a big hit (sorry, I had to do it) in baseball stadium management, maybe it’s time you try it for free to see how it works. You won’t believe how simple it is.

Posted on

Shift bids vs shift swaps – which is right for your business?

Being flexible with shift work is good for business. Even before the pandemic created a nationwide staffing shortage, employees were making it clear that a better work/life balance was becoming a top priority.

A 2019 survey (https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/new-research-shows-that-flexible-working-is-now-a-top-consideration-in-the-war-for-talent-300818790.html) by IWG found that 80% of workers would choose a job with a flexible schedule over one that did not, and more than 30% considered flexibility more important than extra vacation days or a prestigious job title. In addition, a different survey (https://www.flexjobs.com/blog/post/survey-flexible-work-job-choices/) in the same year found 80% of workers would be more loyal to their employer if they had more flexibility over when they worked, with over half trying to negotiate adding this perk with their current manager.

There are two popular ways to inject flexibility into your shift scheduling: shift bids and shift swaps. While they appear similar, they differ in subtle but important ways, and the right one for you will depend on the specifics of your business.

Shift bids and shift swaps – what’s the difference?

Put simply, shift bids are when the manager invites workers to put themselves forward for open shifts. Shift swaps allow workers to arrange to take each other’s shifts directly.

Shift bid example: A retail worker informs the manager that they can’t come in as scheduled on Friday because of a medical appointment. The manager chooses which staff members are best suited to fill that shift and lets them know an extra shift is up for grabs. The manager then chooses who will take the shift from those that express an interest.

Shift swap example: A restaurant worker has a childcare emergency and can’t come in for their scheduled afternoon shift, so they ask their colleague to swap shifts. The colleague agrees, and they present the solution to their manager, who approves it.

Each approach has the desired result: the empty shift is filled. Both are also easily implemented with the right scheduling software, but which method works best for your business depends on several factors.

 

Shift bids keep the manager in control

There are benefits and limitations to shift bids that you should be aware of before considering using them.

Benefits of shift bids

  • The manager gets a choice of different staff members to fill a shift and can pick the best suited. This helps maintain a well-rounded shift with employees who possess all the required skills and experience and work well together.
  • Managers using shift bids may also keep an eye on who is close to working overtime and favor those with fewer hours on the clock, thus controlling costs and spreading available work more evenly.
  • A shift bids system can expand to fill all shifts, not just absences. Workers can rank all available shifts according to their preference, and the manager can use that data to put together a schedule that accommodates as many people as possible.
  • Staff using shift bids have more control over when they work by only putting themselves forward for shifts that fit around their life.

Limitations of shift bids

  • The shift bids approach won’t suit every worker, and some can find the need to bid for their shifts to be stressful.
  • Shift bids can be prone to favoritism and need to be carefully monitored to ensure bids are being handled fairly. This is an area where scheduling software can help, as you can easily check your shift data over time and identify patterns where certain staff members are scheduled – or not – more than others.

Shift swaps can be quick and painless

Shift swaps are simpler to manage than shift bids, but have other pros and cons worth considering.

Benefits of shift swaps

  • By having staff arrange coverage between themselves, shift swaps save the manager’s time.
  • With reliable staff, shift swaps can solve many scheduling issues before they even become a problem.
  • Shift swaps are better suited to solving urgent staffing needs, such as last-minute absences, as they don’t require employees to go through the bidding process.

Limitations of shift swaps

  • The manager has less control over who takes a shift, so unbalanced staff rosters are a risk.
  • Unregulated shift swaps can be prone to over-use by employees and require a robust company policy to clarify the conditions under which shift swaps will be approved.

Choosing the right approach for your company

The scheduling method best suited to your company will depends on several factors.

Company culture

In environments where top-down management is the norm, shift bids are likely to be a better fit. But in businesses where employees are used to having greater autonomy, they’ll likely prefer to arrange shift swaps themselves.

Company size

The larger the company, the more effective shift bidding becomes, as having more staff available to bid on shifts means more choice for managers. And vice versa; the fewer staff members there are, the fewer variables the manager has to keep track of when shifts are swapped.

Worker and managerial experience

A shift swap system works well for companies or locations with reliable long-term staff. For that reason, shift swaps can also benefit new managers or managers who are unfamiliar with all the employees, as it means there is less need to match workers to shifts personally.

All these factors are prone to change over time, but resist the temptation to mix and match shift bids and shift swaps at the same time. Instead, it is better to pick one flexible scheduling system and stick with it for clarity for staff and simplicity for managers.

Flexible shifts help attract and retain staff, and whichever way you approach them will require well-thought-out processes. However, if the practical complexities still seem intimidating, remember that scheduling solutions such as Workforce.com can help automate and track shift bids and shift swaps, freeing up valuable time and headspace for managers.

Posted on

5 retail scheduling best practices – higher sales per labor hour

retail scheduling

Effective retail scheduling isn’t easy. 

Do it well and you’ll engage your associates, reduce turnover, cut costs and build customer loyalty. But poor execution leads to lost revenue, disgruntled employees and inadequate customer service in many ways. 

With the right processes, workplace culture, and retail shift scheduling software, you’ll avoid employee scheduling conflicts and build the most accurate schedule possible. Customer loyalty rises as employee morale and productivity improves. 

If you are a manager or business owner in the retail industry, here are the five retail scheduling best practices.

1. Build predictable schedules

Inconsistent schedules are a major complaint among retail workers. More stability helps employees balance the rest of their lives and responsibilities while still getting enough hours.

Plus, a Harvard Business Review study revealed that stable employee scheduling in retail actually builds productivity and profits. Researchers discovered that sales in stores with more stable scheduling increased by 7 percent and labor productivity increased by 5 percent.

Managers should consider the needs of their staff when building a schedule. It seems obvious but can be easier said than done, especially when managers get a handful of time-off requests. 

While the retail industry can be unpredictable, store managers should avoid scheduling retail workers on short notice. Employees need time to plan for everyday needs like transportation and child care.

Also avoid scheduling employees for “clopenings” — where an employee closes the night shift and opens the following morning. Too often employees are forced to get by on just a few hours of sleep between shifts. 

The Economic Policy Institute notes that irregular work hours, such as clopenings, lead to longer work hours. Policies that reduce or eliminate clopenings and other unstable work schedules will lead to a more productive workforce while helping to avoid unnecessary overtime. 

Perennial work-life imbalance is a proven detriment to stress and health. And in the retail industry, constant juggling of employee scheduling to maintain profits and keep labor costs to a minimum isn’t really necessary.

When employers establish predictability in work schedules, it helps develop clear career paths for employees and provide more opportunities for training. Effective scheduling also is critical so that employees feel like they are supported and part of the organization instead of just punching a time clock.

While having a predictable schedule is better than scheduling on the fly, avoid manual timekeeping methods. They can be manipulated by employees to steal time and also are subject to wage-theft abuse by employers. 

Using automated scheduling software is a great way to make it easier, more cost-efficient and less prone to fraud for a manager to handle this process. Managers can create and share work schedules for all employees to see on their phones, as well as send automated reminders to them before each shift.

schedule template, retail, restaurant employees

Once a workable shift calendar is established, stick to it. And give employees plenty of notice if you plan to change what the average shift looks like.

2. Adhere to predictive scheduling laws

Is your business in a jurisdiction that already has or will have predictive scheduling or fair workweek laws?

Employee scheduling laws vary by city or state, but they generally include four common provisions, according to the National Retail Federation. They are: 

  • Advanced posting of schedules.
  • Employer penalties for unexpected schedule changes.
  • Record-keeping requirements for employers. 
  • Prohibitions on requiring employees to find replacements for scheduled shifts if they are unable to work.

Predictive scheduling dictates advanced scheduling notice. In general, most require two weeks notice, but it can be more. 

Violation costs can add up quickly. New York City, for example, requires retail employers to pay $500 or damages (whichever is greater) for on-call shifts or shift changes with less than 72 hours’ notice, according to the National Law Review.

If you’re running a retail outlet in a city that isn’t yet affected, don’t wait for it to become law. Fair workweek laws will continue to spread across the United States to protect shift workers, so stay ahead of the game by starting to make changes in your organization now. 

Simplified and automated solutions such as Workforce.com’s scheduling software assures that you’ll avoid costly infractions and comply with federal, state, and local labor regulations. You’ll know exactly where you stand with predictive scheduling and fair workweek laws. 

3. Allow employees to swap shifts

Most retailers have a large number of part-time staff. A Korn Ferry survey found that of all retail positions, part-time hourly store employees have the highest turnover rate, with 76 percent average turnover in 2019. 

While a part-time workforce is a necessity, it also presents volatility in your retail scheduling. Store managers spend a lot of time sorting and tracking employee time-off or shift cancellation requests. Last-minute scheduling changes also means managers spend valuable time off the floor to find a replacement.

A well-designed shift swapping policy can work for both sides and ensure that both the retailer and employees eliminate guesswork and get the staff scheduling they need.

Rather than bog down managers with scheduling headaches and leave employees to guess whether their shift is covered, allow your staff to swap shifts through an automated scheduling solution. 

Any employee can request a shift swap in the Workforce.com mobile app. Assuming their manager approves the request, employees available and qualified for that shift will get notifications on their phones. Any of them can indicate in the app that they’d like to swap. When a manager approves the swap, the system automatically updates schedules, which everyone can see in the app.

retail employees scheduling

4. Improve clarity around retail employees’ schedules

Retail employee schedules have been written out on paper or logged in an Excel spreadsheet for decades. It may be a tried-and-true method for some business owners but the only absolute tradition is that manual scheduling leads to confusion.

With pen-and-paper employee schedules, employees often are unaware of last-minute changes. There is no visibility since managers only post the schedules in a break room or near a time clock.

As you can imagine, there are unintended time and attendance violations that managers, HR and payroll must investigate and address. The lack of transparency in scheduling can also lead to disengaged employees who may think managers have a hidden agenda and that favoritism plays into their shift scheduling process.

Knowing whether you’re overstaffed or understaffed and how resources are being managed is at best an educated guess and at worst a crapshoot.

An automated scheduling solution for retailers puts schedules online and visible for all to see. 

workforce software, restaurant, retail employees scheduling

There’s no need for last-minute phone calls or texts to see who is scheduled for that day’s shift. Managers can easily see who’s coming in, what time they’re scheduled to start and which location they’ll be at all from their phone.

With Workforce.com’s workforce app, retail managers keep lines of communication open with all of their full-time and part-time employees. Seeking employee input when possible can help them feel like they have a little more control over their schedules. 

“We are seeing much more communication coming from employers, and what [employers] are sharing with us is employees like it,” said David Kopsch, principal consultant at Mercer in a June 2020 story posted to Workforce.com. “They like this high level of communication. They like the engagement and the concern and empathy that employers are demonstrating.”

5. Assess staffing needs to avoid overtime

Labor forecasting is a must when scheduling your retail workforce. 

Predicting customer demand peaks and valleys to plan ideal staffing levels shouldn’t be left to chance or a manager’s gut instinct.

You may read suggestions that you determine the lowest number of staff required to run your store. “Begin with a bare-bones number and build from there,” some expert may tell you. That is a fool’s errand and completely unnecessary when you use effective labor forecasting software and implement an automated scheduling solution.

According to the Harvard Business Review study, “Practices such as having barebones staff in stores and unstable scheduling (schedules that vary on a day-to-day basis) have flourished in the guise of enabling greater profits for retailers. 

“In study after study for over a decade, operations researchers have found that retailers understaff during peak hours. Increasing staffing, they found, could increase sales and profits. And yet this message on the costs of lean scheduling fell on deaf ears.”

Overstaffing and understaffing can be dangerous for any retailer, which typically runs on small profit margins and must monitor the company’s labor budget. A staffing decision that smartly cuts labor costs while maintaining superior customer service benefits your bottom line.

Varying the types of employees that you schedule helps keep your full-time employees from accumulating overtime hours that can drive labor costs up. And allowing part-time employees to work alongside experienced full-timers provides valuable on-the-job training that they can’t get anywhere else. 

The Workforce.com Live Wage Tracker allows managers to adjust staffing levels to optimize profits. 

live wage tracker, workforce.com software, restaurant , retail employees

Building retail schedules every week that can change at a moment’s notice is a constant challenge. But with retail scheduling best practices and implementing automated retail scheduling software, you can save time, reduce turnover, build employee morale and cut costs. Book your demo today.

Posted on

Ferguson Plarre saves over $100,000 a year using Auto-Scheduling

Ferguson Plarre, Workforce.com, retail, scheduling

Ferguson Plarre is one of the longest standing and most renowned producers of hand baked goods. The family-owned business has a rich history of providing customers with sweets and savories since the 1800s. 

The company faced a number of workforce challenges such as difficulty navigating excessive amounts of administration and spending on overtime due to scheduling inefficiencies. 

Since finding Workforce.com, Ferguson Plarre has seen great success in improving day-to-day operations and employee satisfaction. “It has just freed up so much time for my leaders to be able to actually focus on the projects that make us money and are better for the business, rather than sitting there putting spreadsheets together, trying to figure out what labor is going to cost,” said Chris Tankard, culture and human resources manager at Ferguson Plarre.

$100,000 saved on wage spend, hundreds of hours saved on administration

After implementing Workforce.com, the company saved $100,000 on wage spend and reduced hundreds of hours in administrative work. They saved the equivalent of two full-time staff members when it comes to cutting of administration across production, scheduling and reporting. These valuable savings allowed them to reallocate their resources to other more valuable areas of the business. 

Following their implementation of Workforce.com, Ferguson Plarre has adopted a highly optimized scheduling process, allowing them to accommodate for the constantly shifting demand for their products, significantly reducing the time spent maintaining staff schedules, absences and staffing costs.

How legacy systems and processes can dramatically hinder success

Ferguson Plarre is committed to delivering freshly baked goods to its stores. With a staff of more than 150 employees, their goal is to provide the best quality products while catering for constant shifts in their day-to-day sales. As such, they require a staff management system that can optimize their schedule according to demand data. 

Previous systems used at Ferguson Plarre failed to achieve the results they needed to achieve their business mission. Their previous scheduling software was a platform that employees throughout the company avoided. Staff were reluctant to use it due to issues with reliability. Meanwhile, the managerial team found a great deal of effort was required to make basic adjustments to staff schedules, pay rates and documents. 

Not having access to the tools they needed led to higher staffing costs, frustrated staff and the inability to dedicate time and energy to areas of the business that add value. As a result, the company was left with significant sunk costs in a system that didn’t give them outcomes and satisfaction in return.

Implementing a system that helps your business grow

Tankard set out to find a user-friendly system that would be eagerly adopted by his team, a solution that would allow his frontline staff to start thinking like business owners. Finding a great system functions more like a partnership than a service, especially when it comes to managing areas of the business as important as your employees.

Here’s how the team at Workforce.com works with Ferguson Plarre to manage and improve their operations and business:

Auto-scheduling software

  • Ferguson Plarre uses Workforce.com’s automated scheduling platform to create more efficient shifts for their staff.
  • Scheduling according to demand allows Ferguson Plarre to schedule staff on a room-by-room basis, ensuring they never over- or under-staff stations.
  • The shift swapping software lets staff easily request altered schedules, reducing the time managers spent maintaining it. It also helps protect the bottom line as the platform shows how much swaps will cost.
  • Auto-scheduling ensures that Ferguson Plarre keeps unnecessary overtime to a minimum, reducing staffing costs across the company.

Digital timesheets

  • Automatic timesheet generation means Ferguson Plarre can generate and approve accurately costed timesheets in bulk each pay period.
  • Timesheet software automatically flagged any variance in wage spend, aiding Tankard and the team in adhering to their budgeting KPIs.
  • Workforce.com’s timesheet software synced to Ferguson Plarre’s payroll system, allowing them to export the data without any manual entry each pay period, significantly reducing the required labor hours.

Reporting

  • Workforce.com’s dashboards and reporting suite means Tankard and the team could access valuable workforce metrics and modify their business practices for efficiency.
  • Digital reporting and storage means Ferguson Plarre can easily access historical reports and monitor their performance over time.

Compliance

  • Workforce.com’s labor compliance engine applies the correct pay rates, overtime, and allowances to completed shifts, eliminating the need to manually calculate pay rates and amend timesheets.

Thorough implementation guarantees a fast return on investment

Business tools only begin to return benefits when they are implemented quickly and adopted fully across the company. It’s not uncommon to find businesses adopting newer and better processes, only to be caught in the implementation stage, receiving fractional value for an extended period of time. For Ferguson Plarre, a gold standard implementation process was imperative.

Workforce.com assigned a dedicated implementation consultant to Ferguson Plarre. This ensures that the implementation would run smoothly, so they could start getting value from the system as soon as possible. Workforce.com assisted Tankard and his team through the setup, integrating their existing systems into Workforce.com and ensuring that staff knew how to use the system. 

Simplifying the administrative processes to focus on creating value

Workforce.com provides Ferguson Plarre with greatly simplified administrative processes, allowing them to focus on the things that matter. 

Moving forward, Ferguson Plarre will continue to build on its rich history and continue to delight customers. As the business landscape continues to shift, they are well-equipped to face these changes because they have a platform that enables them to be agile and make data-driven decisions. 

Workforce management has a lot of moving parts, but it doesn’t have to be a burden. Workforce.com can take out the administrative side of managing your team so you can focus more on growing your business. See our platform in action and book a demo today.

Posted on

Proper shift coverage requires more communication and better technology

Proper Shift Coverage

Creating a good schedule can be difficult, and laws in certain states and cities may place restrictions on things like how far in advance you create a schedule or if employees can work back-to-back shifts. Meanwhile, various trends of the 2010s and disruptions in 2020 have shifted some of the scheduling norms that managers used to rely on. 

David Kopsch, a principal at Mercer’s Atlanta office, discussed how managers can create well-staffed shifts. Whether in more stable or more uncertain economic times, this guidance can help managers. 

Communication is key

At the most fundamental level, there must be clear means of communication between managers and employees about the basics of the shifts like: What are the hours of operation? How early must workers arrive before doors open? How late should workers expect to stay after closing? 

Managers should also keep lines of communication open with employees, Kopsch said. They can learn the hours employees want to work and the hours they’re available. Listening to employee input when possible can help employees feel like they have a little more control over their schedules. 

An uptick in technology solutions 

There has been an increase in the adoption of technology that can help with determining staff coverage, especially in times of major disruptions, like COVID-19, Kopsch said. More organizations are either contracting with vendors or developing their own applications, which helps both managers and employees feel more confident that schedules are accurate and compliant with whatever scheduling regulations may apply to the worksite.

On-call shifts are getting a backlash

While employers may still be interested in on-call shifts to ensure that a shift is perfectly staffed, there’s been pushback recently on this practice, Kopsch said. And some new scheduling regulations have put restrictions on on-call shifts or require employers to pay an on-call employee even if they do not end up working. 

More accurate labor forecasting is one solution to make managers less dependent on on-call shifts by more accurately determining how many employees are needed for a given time and making understaffing or overstaffing less likely. 

You don’t need to rely on predetermined shift patterns

While there are shift patterns managers have historically relied on, they aren’t necessary for proper shift coverage, Kopsch said. Workers in general are requesting more flexibility with their schedules, when they’re available to work and when they want to work.

In the past employers may have offered an opening shift from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. and a closing shift from 3 p.m. to 10 p.m. But such set-in-stone shifts may not work for an employee who has to take their children to school in the morning. They may be available for an 8 or 8:30 shift but not the 7 o’clock shift, which is doable if managers rely on a more flexible scheduling system.

The pivot toward more flexible scheduling began about five years ago, Kopsch said. The more rigid shift coverage structure meant employers had a more difficult time finding employees, especially if employees worked second jobs, took classes or had child care or elder care responsibilities. Flexibility allows employees the opportunity to work somewhere they otherwise couldn’t because of these other responsibilities. 

Proper Shift Coverage

Ultimately, flexibility makes employees feel more respected and strengthens the employee value proposition. 

This is especially true during times of disruption, like COVID-19. Businesses may now have different hours of operation and sanitation rules that impact an employee’s hours, and employers need to be even more flexible to employees in this new environment, Kopsch said. 

Stay competitive even in times of high unemployment 

Flexible scheduling is a competitive advantage for organizations interested in creating a high employee value proposition. This competitive advantage is important even when the unemployment rate is high, Kopsch said. While logic presumes that employees want to work more than ever in these times, the reality is that organizations still have to create a compelling experience and a positive environment for employees to want to work for them.

When someone is out of work, it may be because they have responsibilities like child care or parental care that inhibits them from finding a day job to pay the bills, Kopsch said. If an employer is competitive in how they schedule shifts and how much they take employee input into account when creating schedules, workers in situations like this may be able to take the job. 

Also, employees appreciate choice. They want to work somewhere they can be themselves, feel safe and, as a result of employment, meet their needs. Then they will feel committed to the job and go to work, Kopsch said. 

“But if they perceive that the employer’s brand does not resonate with them or the wages the employer pays are not going to meet their needs, then it’s likely the employer needs to take action on that,” he added.

 

Posted on

Shift swap software empowers managers and employees to take charge of scheduling

shift scheduling for hourly restaurant workers, shift swap

Employers must have been taking notes from athletic coaches when they started naming shift schedules. The 2-3-2, the DuPont, four on four off, and going EOWEO all sound like a defensive strategy or a trick play. (For the record, EOWEO stands for Every Other Weekend Off, not a signal to Tom Brady to throw the football to Rob Gronkowski.)

Whatever the terminology, shift schedules remain the lifeblood of an hourly workforce. Whether it’s 12-hour shift schedule types or a traditional 24 hours on and 48 hours off scheduling system for firefighters, shift swapping also is a key tool for employees and managers to maintain both consistency in staffing levels and  a vibrant, engaged talent pool.

Accommodating a shift swap

Shift swapping lets an employee request to work one of their shifts and in exchange, work one of that colleague’s scheduled shifts.

Establish a written policy that provides clear guidance to staff while simultaneously ensuring the organization’s needs are met. Make sure the policy is clear and easy to understand. Don’t overcomplicate it; the simpler the better. Implementing an easy-to-use shift swapping software simplifies the process, which can otherwise bog down into an arduous, overly complicated back-and-forth among employees that wastes everyone’s time.

Benefits for employers 

A manual, paper-based shift swapping policy that relies on employees scrambling to cover for each other is a risk at best and a chronic, chaotic scheduling disaster waiting to happen. Managers play an integral role in closely monitoring shift swapping. Their oversight assures that every shift will be fully covered. 

Through innovative workforce management technology, managers can approve shift swaps with complete oversight of costs and compliance. The technology empowers managers to: 

  • Control staffing levels — eliminating understaffing and overstaffing.
  • Monitor so staff members swap shifts with colleagues who have similar skills and experience.
  • Lower the potential for no-show employees.
  • Reduce overtime.
  • Create a deadline for shift swaps.
  • Distribute unwanted shifts fairly and evenly among all employees.
  • Customize to control cost, employee availability, qualifications and fatigue management.

Benefits for employees

Employees have lives away from work, and there are times when they need to get a shift covered. Family issues, a sudden illness or a day away for mental health, if the shift is claimed, the employee will be free to take the day off. If not, the employee remains responsible for the shift. Shift swapping software allows employees to: 

  • Post the shift for all fellow employees to see.
  • Control their own schedules.
  • Get a shift covered quickly and easily.
  • Create a more complete work/life balance.
  • Build camaraderie and teamwork through communication.
  • Earn additional money by picking up extra shifts.

With the freedom that employees will enjoy through shift swapping technology, managers still control the approval process and hold the power to override a shift swap in case a specific exchange is seen as unworkable or create unnecessary costs.

Shift swap software allows managers to prevent employees from constantly posting their shifts and become a stand-in for requesting time off.

Additionally, no one benefits from the employee who continually volunteers to work day after day after day, double shifts and late night-early morning shifts. Managers can track that employee and curb shifts and hours, since there is the potential for burnout as well as safety concerns for fellow employees.

Finally, misunderstandings over a missed shift are a thing of the past. Shift swapping technology puts the responsibility to fill the shift squarely on employees. Managers OK the swap, leaving them with more spare time to do things other than babysit the schedule.

Organizations need a reliable employee scheduling plan while employees want job flexibility that adapts to life outside of work. With Workforce.com’s shift-swapping software, a carefully planned shift swapping policy manages employee costs, accommodates employer and employee needs and ensures that both get the schedule they want.