Employees scheduling is another responsibility of managers to ensure smooth operations. It may seem a simple task, but the planning and frequency make it prone to some serious mistakes. The organisation can lose productive hours, clients, and even employees as the consequences of these mistakes.
However, these mistakes are easily avoidable with the help of some technology. Your business can apply for loans with no guarantor to invest in tools to streamline the project management and reduce errors. Alternatively, the managers can learn about the possible mistakes to avoid them with the manual employee scheduling.
Here, you will find 9 tips to avoid the common mistakes with the employees scheduling for the managers and team leaders.
Schedule Once a Week
As a manager, you already have a packed schedule that can exhaust even the most laborious professionals. You may forget to schedule the next day for the employees because of the rush. This is a major problem with too much employee scheduling.
Moreover, the risk of errors with the scheduling will increase, and the times you perform it each week. You can avoid these errors by creating a schedule for the whole week and review it each day. It is easier to make changes than creating a schedule on the busiest of days.
Store Documents Online
A lot of paperwork is involved with the hiring and task allocation of the employees. You need to store those documents in a secure area because of their confidential nature. Many people lose documents while scheduling the tasks for hourly workers or freelancers.
You can use the online tools to store the information in a secure location. Cloud computing comes with two-factor authentication and separate password for locked folders. You can access them to allocate tasks to eliminate the risk of losing them.
Distribute Hours Fairly between Employees
Managers must distribute the hours fairly among the team members to avoid any dispute or hard feeling. Favouritism while allocating tasks and shifts is a strict no in the professional environment. The employees may show their resentment towards the biased scheduling.
Your team performance will take a serious hit along with your reputation as the manager. The subordinates will find it hard to trust you because of the biased decisions, even though they are unintentional. Moreover, the employee retention rate may not remain the same with the increase in resentment.
Optimise the Cost
Your organisation may hire hourly workers or freelancers to reduce the stress on employees. They will have different rates for the task that will affect the overall cost of operations. Therefore, consider the overall cost before scheduling the tasks and shift among the employees.
Moreover, the permanent employees also receive different payments for their overtime and different shifts. You can select the employees for overtime based on the complexity of the task and the salaries of the employees. These small savings may contribute to a significant cost-cutting for small businesses.
Proper Communication Channel
Organisations with many employees should ask the employees to use a separate account for professional communication. This will declutter their inbox from personal communication to people outside the office. The important mails and messages will not get lost among the clutter with this approach.
WhatsApp and similar app require group members to share personal information. Many employees may not feel comfortable sharing it with the entire organisation. Therefore, an official communication channel is essential for many reasons in an organisation.
Simple Shift Swapping among Employees
A business that depends on multiple shifts may not afford an hour of unattended customers. The employees might have to spend extra hours waiting for the person to arrive for their shift. This will stretch them with the unnecessary workload.
Moreover, the customer may not feel the same level of support from the representatives. Thus, make sure the employees don’t have any reason to blame the scheduling for the unattended shifts. New business can take loans for the unemployed without a guarantor to install scheduling and other employee management tools for the shift timing.
Do Not Procrastinate
Employees have their personal life with some important moments to attend. You should not expect them to skip birthdays or some event for last-minute scheduling. Therefore, avoid procrastination and inform them about the timings and tasks in advance.
They may miss the calls, messages, or even emails through the regular channels. You should always communicate through the official communication channel. Also, ask them to notify you about any event to make changes to the schedule in advance.
Play with the Team Strength
Every employee has strengths and weaknesses that should remain a priority while scheduling. You should use their strengths to keep the staff perfectly balanced during a shift. Moreover, it makes no sense to put the best employees in a single shift.
Many scheduling tools come with a ranking system for employees based on their profiles and roles. You can use them to optimise the schedule without much trouble. The customers from a shift will not suffer, and the quality at work will remain the same.
Ask Employees for Preferences
Employees will work more efficiently if they receive the due recognition for their opinion, performance, and preferences. It will make them feel respected and valued at the workspace. Therefore, consider their requests while scheduling to build a strong relationship with them.
It is okay to accept the request if they have some obligations or genuine reason for the schedule change. Their work will not have a negative impact on their personal life. The engagement will increase along with the retention rate in the organisation.
Again, the employee management tools come with features to manage these requests. The employees will have a proper leave process to ask for time off. It will help create the schedule with the available resources and remember the unavailable resources for the managers.
Conclusion
In the end, the complexity of the employees scheduling will cause some minor issues regardless of the technology used. Even without the tools, it is okay to make mistakes with the process as long as the damage is under control. Just make sure you have the list of requests, requirements, and tasks on the table while creating a schedule.