We were recently at the RSPA Retail Now trade show, in Orlando, FL. It was a great show, and we got to sit down with some of our solution provider’s to talk about TimeForge, and how TimeForge was affecting all of our customers. Our dealers include POS providers and manufacturers for restaurants, grocery stores, payroll providers, general retail, and many others.
We had a great time, and got to share some of our experience implementing TimeForge for our customers (and also the experiences of our dealers implementing the software). Some of these key insights included:
- Communication amongst personnel is essential to a exceptional schedule. Shift swaps, requests for days off, staffing minimums, changes in availability, and upcoming business requirements (private parties, birthdays, etc…) will require more from the personnel than any one manager will estimate. Communication is crucial to certify a peaceful workday.
- Confirm that employees have any required certifications, and that the certifications are up-to-date. A staff member working without the correct certifications can mean thousands of dollars worth of fines by numerous policing authorities, and can land the manager that was on-duty in jail in some locales.
- Reusing a schedule from the preceding week is a swift way to build a schedule for the forthcoming week. But this procedure of labor schedule creation assumes that the prior schedule was satisfactory. How do you figure? Use a variety of metrics to decide if the schedule was a good fit for your business – actual vs. theoretical, the number of changed shifts, were staff members content, how many no-shows transpired, was the confirmed payroll within an sufficient range of the actual sales (or customer throughput)?
- Cross training is an wonderful management method to certify that when the unpredictable occurs, your business is ready. Workers who have been cross trained are capable of carrying out multiple tasks. When employees neglect to show up to work, or an emergency arises at the establishment, the personnel are equipped to take care of the situation.
- Early clockins and late clockouts can greatly diminish the profits from your business. Every staff member that clocks in early, or clocks out late is using up valuable profits that could be used for fund expansion, bestowing raises, and paying bills. Keep an eye out for workers who ride the clock by supervising the employee schedules, and contrasting clock in and out times to scheduled work times.
- Management spends hours toying with and putting together the labor schedule every week. Keep personnel satisfied and use TimeForge to build the labor schedules. Staff members stay content because they know what the plan is, and managers are satisfied because they can put together an employee schedule in mere seconds.
TimeForge scheduling software is used by owners and operators of restaurants, retail stores, bars, grills, grocery stores, and other service-oriented businesses to increase profits, reduce turnover, and improve retention.
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