How to Schedule Employees Effectively

Running a business is no easy routine, and one of the most common problems faced by business owners is employee scheduling. Proper employee scheduling is not just about simply filling up time slots with names and being done with it. When done correctly, employee scheduling can help you to run your business better and more efficiently. 

While there is no perfect work schedule (sorry managers out there), you can still take the proper measures to ensure maximum productivity and efficiency. Today, let us share with you some tips on how to schedule your employees effectively. 

1. Know your ideal schedule 

Before you start to plan your employee schedules, the first thing you should do is to find out what schedule best suits your business. Do you have certain peak periods that you want to take care of? Do you have off-peak hours that require less manpower? Or do you have a junior that require you to assign mentors to? 

These are things that will make a huge difference in terms of who you assign to each slot. Juniors may need seniors/mentors in the same time slot, and peak hours may require a full workforce. Once you have these pinned down, you can now start to plan your schedule. 

2. Know your employees 

When we say know your employees, we don’t mean just knowing how many siblings they have, what their hobbies are, and who their favourite K-Pop idol is. We are talking about knowing their strengths and weaknesses. Each employee is undeniably unique and they will have their own skills as well as weaknesses. 

Knowing people takes time, and it takes effort. While most managers will try to do away with this, knowing employees well can help you to plan a better schedule. Know what they are good at, whether it is attention to detail, good critical thinking, crowd management etc. 

That way, you can plan a schedule that combines employees with skill sets that complement each other. 

3. Have an open communication with everyone 

Regardless of what industry you operate in, having an easy method of communication with everyone in the team will make scheduling easier. Everyone should be on the same page and are aligned with one another. This is especially important if you are in a fast paced business like retail and restaurants. 

Having proper team-wide communication can be the difference between being understaffed and running your business at maximum efficiency. All team members should be aware of the roster, and any emergencies that occur should be immediately reported so that someone else can cover for you. 

4. Try to be accommodating to everyone 

We understand that each of us have our commitments, and that applies to your fellow team members as well. Are part-timers scheduled too tightly? Are full-timers under-scheduled? Or do certain members of your team have to leave work at 5pm sharp everyday to pick up her child from school? 

While it is impossible to accommodate everything, we do advise that you try to, especially when the reason is reasonable. Now you may ask how this relates to employee scheduling? Well it simply makes them more happy and satisfied with their job. It shows that you, as a manager, truly care about their needs. This results in happier employees, and happier employees definitely work better and harder. 

5. Use a scheduling software 

Why go through the trouble of using pen and paper, and still risk missing out on some important details? By using a proper employee scheduling software, managers can save time as rosters are easily created with a few clicks. 

You can easily pull up available team members and their schedules and plan your roster accordingly. The roster can also be shared in real time to all team members so that everyone is aware of their own schedules. StaffAny is created with efficiency in mind. It helps you to consolidate schedules, timeclock, and timesheets all in one place. So you can make time to focus on what matters. 

If you are interested in knowing more about StaffAny and how much it can potentially help you save in costs, hit us up. Let’s talk.