When it comes to scheduling for your staff, it is not as easy as many people think that it is. It can be difficult keeping all of your staff happy because they are your best asset and so you need to do whatever you can to make sure that they stay with your company and don’t leave. It’s all about good time management and making sure that you come up with the most efficient way to get your employees to come in to work. Depending on the sector that you operate in, you may need to set up a schedule that incorporates split schedules and this makes things even more difficult.
One of the first things that you need to look into is roster software because this is the very thing that simplifies your whole business employee work schedule and this helps to make the management duties more straightforward. It can be difficult however keeping your employees happy and doing what is best for your business. Apart from using the above software, the following are just some ways that can help to make scheduling easier for your Australian business.
- Understand staffing work times – You need to have a proper understanding about the availability of your employees and what levels that they work at. Some of your employees will want to work extra hours while others will not and so you have to factor that into your scheduling as well. It’s best to approach them and just ask them outright what hours they would like to work and if they are available for overtime. If you have the right kind of software in place then you should be able to get an idea of employee availability throughout the year.
- Allow staff to change schedules – This is something that employers are reluctant to do but you should be able to let your staff make decisions about their scheduling without actually running it past you first. This allows your staff members to be a lot more flexible in the workplace and it helps to reduce your overall stress levels. As long as they make sure that they have cover for themselves with other staff members then it makes sense to let them have control over their time.
- Always factor in labour costs – The key is to try to keep your labour costs down and so make sure that your plans are accurate so that you don’t schedule too many people when you don’t need them for that particular day. If you consider your labour while you are setting up a schedule then you can budget better to suit your business and your employees.
In order to improve upon productivity and to make sure your employees are being more efficient, make sure that you ask for their feedback because this allows them to tell you about certain scheduling that they are not happy about and it helps you to understand what they are saying in a better way.
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