Managing staff effectively is crucial to planning operations successfully for any organisation, regardless of sector - whether healthcare, retail, manufacturing or service - or business size. Rostering and scheduling are staff management techniques. Although they may be used in place of each other, rostering and scheduling create different scenarios and have different strengths, weaknesses, limitations and benefits.
Understanding Rostering
A roster is a document that indicates staff members' attendance and other considerations for a planned period. Rostering is a method of managing the staff that is commonly used elsewhere, when working patterns were generally stable or labour requirements were constant. For example, healthcare workers need to work a pre-determined rotation of a set number of days/times in a month, and manufacturers have a consistent production schedule.
Benefits
Stablity
Rostering allows employees the prospect of having a consistent work schedule, which means they can plan their outside-of-work life around their work while likely leading to improved job satisfaction and work-life balance.
Efficiency
For companies that have had the same general patterns of work, rosters can be more efficient than including schedules every single week. Rostering can reduce administrative overhead by not having to adjust your shifts every week.
Cost Control
Rostering provides better controls on labour costs by staffing levels to match expected demand and mitigating overstaffing or understaffing throughout the course of various parts of the day or week.
Reduced Overtime
Rostering improves the even distribution of working hours to employees and ideally minimises commitment to overtime.
Disadvantages
Immutability
A roster can become difficult to manage when changes arise, like when an employee calls in sick or demand is higher than expected. Changing a fixed roster can be difficult.
Employee Preferences
Rosters might not consider employee preferences regarding the specific shifts or days off, potentially resulting in an unhappy workforce.
Lack of flexibility
Some industries experience high and low volumes of work, which may impact rostering flexibility. For example, the retail sector may find it difficult to apply fixed rostering in busy shopping periods.
Understanding Scheduling
On the other hand, scheduling refers to the process of creating dynamic and flexible plans that assign shifts to workers for the short term, often weekly or even daily. Scheduling can be especially beneficial for organisations in environments such as hospitality, retail and customer service that also seem to constantly be evolving and have alternating workloads and demand.
Benefits
Employee Input
With scheduling systems, employees often have a fair amount of input into their schedules, likely leading to a boost in job satisfaction and improved retention.
Efficiency in Variable Demand
Scheduling can allow organisations to better align staffing levels with their current demands, thereby maximising labour costs in environments with unpredictable demands.
Overtime Management
Scheduling systems can also assist in managing and controlling overtime hours more effectively, ultimately reducing labour costs.
Flexibility
Scheduling provides organisations with the ability to respond quickly to changing work patterns and unexpected scenarios by adjusting shifts at short notice to provide enough staff.
Disadvantages
Complexity
Producing schedules regularly, particularly for large, complex organisations with numerous employees, can be an arduous process and administratively time-consuming.
Uncertainty
Employees may have a tough time scheduling their lives around their work, and this can impact overall wellness when work scheduling is constantly changing.
Labour Costs
In some cases, being able to flex your schedule could result in higher labour costs because it may require you to bring in extra staff to manage peak business hours.
How to Choose the Right Approach?
Selecting rostering versus scheduling is not a binary choice; it is contextual, dependent on the type of business, industry, and workforce. Below are some things to think about:
Work Environment
Consider how predictable your work is! If you are in an industry where the work pattern is reasonably stable and predictable, then rostering may be a better option for you. However, if your business often sees patterns of demand that fluctuate frequently, scheduling may be better.
Employee preferences
Consider how important it is to your employees to participate in shaping their schedules and how important it is to allow them flexibility to change shifts. Scheduling systems typically provide some flexibility in this aspect.
Labour Costs
You must consider how confining your labour costs you need to be. Rostering allows you to restrict your labour costs. Scheduling may allow for some flexibility, but the more flexibility provided, the less control of labour and it will therefore likely be more costly..
Compliance
Be aware of any relevant legal or regulatory requirements that may exist within your industry regarding working hours, breaks and rest periods. The schedule and the rostering process both have to align with these.
Technology
Investigate the software solutions available for staff management, and many organisations believe that using specialised workforce management software enables organisations to have more effective, efficient and flexible scheduling.
Employee Satisfaction
Most importantly, the happiness and well-being of your employees matter most. Try to listen carefully to feedback and consider your employees' needs when determining how to approach staff management.
Conclusion
Although you may think of rostering and scheduling as two separate staff management strategies, each approach has its advantages and disadvantages, and will ultimately come down to the preference and needs of your particular business. In situations where work is predictable and learned (an industry with common routines), you will benefit from the stability and consistency offered by rostering; in industries with less predictable schedules and less learned behaviours will benefit from the flexibility and cheaper overhead that scheduling offers staff. Ultimately, there is no right or wrong way when it comes to managing staff; the key to good staff management is knowing your organisation and selecting the suitability of roster or schedule to its context.
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