In today’s tech-savvy world, managers know what it takes to whip up a schedule using those handy schedule creators. Who wouldn’t want to perfect the work schedule, whether you’re running a restaurant, call centre, or any industry with shift work?

Today, we are exploring the art of crafting a work schedule that caters to each employee’s unique needs and life circumstances. When we talk about top-notch schedule planning, we also talk about sleek automated scheduling, outstanding reporting tools, seamless payroll integration, flexibility, and the capability to adjust things around the clock. Sounds interesting? Keep reading for all the details.

What Is a Schedule Creator?

A work schedule creator is a digital tool you can find online or in an app. It’s a lifesaver for managers to allocate employee shifts and track progress, making their roles easier. In the past, managers had to manually handle all the scheduling, which was time-consuming. They had to deal with disorganised schedules, last-minute holiday requests, absenteeism, and conflicts. But now, with automated scheduling software — an employee’s schedule creator, the problem is solved! Just use these ready-made templates to keep things straightforward and avoid disputes.

How to Create a Schedule for Employees Easily?

Managers can create schedules online with automated tools easily. Here is a relaxed guide to creating a scheduling spreadsheet:

1. Start your spreadsheet program and open a new sheet.
2. Add some column headings to keep everything organised.
3. Put “Employee Name” in column A.
4. If you’re into employee IDs, place those in column B.
5. Label the following columns with the days of the week, starting with Monday or whichever works for your week.
6. Enter your employee names and IDs under the appropriate headings.
7. Fill in the blanks with shift times, using “am” and “pm” for clarity, or use military time if you prefer.

Once you’ve sorted it out, share the schedule with your team in the best way — whether it’s posted on the notice board, through email, or on your internal chat. Ensure everyone can see freshly made schedules to know when to clock in. Easy, isn’t it?

Meet Shifton Daily Planner Online

Check out Shifton’s cloud service — it’s like your trusty companion for quickly planning work schedules! With a few clicks, you can adjust shifts, jot down notes, confirm who’s in or out, manage time-off requests, and more!

Here is what you get:

• A weekly schedule planner that keeps things legal.
• Instant updates to keep everyone informed.
• An open shifts auction to fill those gaps effortlessly.
• Easy-to-use shift patterns for stress-free scheduling.
• A timesheet tracker to tally up those hours and wages.

With Shifton, creating schedules is as easy as pie. It has brilliant automation features that speed things up, and you can save and reuse templates quickly. The result? A neat table that’s a doddle to navigate.

Why You Should Use a Daily Planner Online for Staff Scheduling

So picture this: you’re a manager and have to juggle employee schedules, right? Well, that’s where scheduling software comes in handy. It’s like having your assistant, but digital!

Here is why a daily planner is invaluable:

• Easy Templates: There’s no need to start creating schedules from scratch every time. With a daily planner, you’ve got a selection of schedule templates to choose from. Pick one that suits your business, and you’re ready. It saves you time and keeps things looking professional.
• Get Your Team Involved: Give your employees access to the system, and they can check their shifts themselves. Less schedule hassle for you, less back-and-forth. Plus, you get to approve any shift swaps, so it’s all fair and square.
• Handy Notifications: Turn on push notifications, and your team gets an alert when the latest schedule is up. No more excuses for missing shifts!
• Smooth Conflict Resolution: Holidays? Planned time off? No problem. Employees can request time off directly, and you can approve or deny as needed. The scheduling app adjusts the schedule automatically.
• Schedule Anywhere, Anytime: Forget being stuck in the office. With a Shifton daily planner, you can produce schedules from anywhere with Wi-Fi. Whether at home or grabbing a coffee, you’ve got the flexibility to get things done when it suits you best.

By using the Shifton Schedule Planner, managers can save heaps of time making work schedules, giving them more space to handle other crucial parts of running any business. This convenient online tool is like having an extra pair of hands, making daily tasks smoother and keeping the restaurant running like clockwork. But let’s delve deeper!

Get Ahead with Restaurant Management Software!

Have you ever heard of the Shifton schedule app? It’s like a magic wand for restaurant owners, helping them increase staff efficiency and productivity. With restaurant management software, you can quickly sort out employee shift schedules, ensuring everyone gets their fair share of time off to stay sharp. And the best part? Your staff can swap shifts hassle-free, giving them more freedom and boosting their motivation at work.

Here’s why it’s invaluable:

• It quickly creates optimal staff rotation schedules, particularly for those busy Friday nights or holiday rushes.
• It’s super easy to use. Everything’s neatly organised in one place.
• You can check schedules and make changes anytime, anywhere — no more headaches.

With the Shifton app, managers can breeze through scheduling tasks and focus on running a smooth operation in the restaurant business.

Discover How Workforce Management Call Centre Software Can Help!

Managing a call centre can be challenging. It requires extensive knowledge, including planning work shifts. Moreover, you’re dealing with tight schedules, many customer calls, and high expectations from higher-ups. It’s a tough job, no doubt. You must ensure customer satisfaction while protecting your team and the company’s bottom line.

The Shifton schedule planning service is like your trusty sidekick, making the whole process a breeze. It’s all covered under one roof, from sorting out shifts to tracking tasks and leave requests.

Check out these perks:

• The visual schedule builder constructs shift assignments like a pro.
• It takes the pain out of creating schedules for any number of call centre projects and staff.
• Keeps schedule tabs on everything from staff availability to worked hours, so you’re always in the loop.
• When it comes to payroll, it’s a lifesaver — it calculates salaries according to the given schedules, overtime, and all the details.

Plus, the Shifton app is super user-friendly, so everyone in the call centre can get on board. With Shifton, managing schedules and tasks has never been easier!

Wrap-Up

So there you have it! Shifton’s schedule creator is the real deal when crafting the perfect work schedule for your team. It’s not just about mastering shifts; it’s also about effortlessly managing schedule tasks, keeping up with social media, handling payroll, and ensuring employee comfort and well-being, among other things. Running a restaurant, a call centre, scheduling hotel shifts, or maintaining order in a salon or fitness centre can be challenging. However, with Shifton, scheduling becomes a walk in the park.

Automated scheduling reduces time spent juggling schedules and ensures everyone’s in the right place at the right time. So why wait? Sign up now and try our online employee schedule app for free during the trial period!

With the release of our latest modules ‘Activities’ and ‘Demand & Forecasting’ it became clear that Shifton has developed into something more than just a straightforward shift planning solution. In fact, we have too many modules, and we want to simplify their comprehension. We have decided to merge certain modules, providing more value with a single click, thereby changing the pricing for some modules to reflect their increased value.

The base module will now include three additional reports: ‘Budget reports’, ‘Company employees’ and ‘Minimum weekly work time report’. The base module price will change to $1 to reflect these additions and the plethora of other features we’ve added as base functionality over the years.

‘Time off requests’ will offer insightful features, previously part of ‘Vacation Management’, and the price will be $1. It now includes ‘Time Off Reports’ at no additional cost.

The price of the ‘Attendance’ module will change to $1, and the following modules will be priced at $0.5: ‘Employee working hours’, ‘Bonuses/Retentions’ & ‘Pay rate reports’. The latter has been renamed to ‘Payroll’ to reflect recent enhancements to its functionality and our future plans for further expansion.

These changes will take immediate effect for all new customers. Existing customers will enjoy the new extended modules at the old price until the 1st of September 2024, after which their pricing will also be updated.

We value our customers and believe these changes will help them manage the features they need with greater ease.

Want to know more? Contact us at support@shifton.com

Most workers have a regular Monday to Friday work week with a typical 9-10 AM to 6-7 PM workday. However, this method of scheduling employees doesn’t suit organisations and companies that have to work round-the-clock: hospitals, call centres, and fire departments, just to name a few.

For example, many fire departments implement a 48/96 hour work schedule. That means that firemen typically have to work for two days straight and are given 4 days off. While they do have to be alert for two days with little time for sleep or rest, recent studies have shown that this shift work type leaves them enough time for leisure, sleep and preparing for the next rotation.

Each hospital must always have nurses available to provide 24/7 patient care. They can work 8/12-hour shifts on a 3 workdays/3 days off or 2 workdays/2 days off schedule. As a rule, nurses work fixed shifts (day or night). For example, daytime nurses start working at 7 AM and finish at 7 PM, while night-time caregivers start at 7 PM, work late night shift hours and finish at 7 AM.

Call centres may have their own rules of shift work, however, there are several common ways of achieving a steady 24/7 work cycle. Managers typically divide a day into 2 or 3 shifts. In the first case, a day is divided into two 12-hour shifts for morning and evening workers. The second variant allows having three 8-hour shifts. For example: 6 AM – 2 PM (1st), 2 PM – 10 PM (2nd), and 10 PM — 6 AM (3rd).

In some cases, employees are required to alternate between shifts: work morning shifts for a couple of days and then switch to a night shift for the same period. According to the latest research, a change in working hours negatively affects sleep and eating patterns. Working a night shift schedule can cause insomnia, high blood pressure, weight and appetite disorders. This article will detail the proper ways of adapting to a nighttime schedule.

12-hour night shift sleep schedule example

The human body’s circadian rhythm determines waking and resting hours. People who work in organisations with a 24/7 work cycle, including policemen, firemen, nurses, call centre operators, and petrol station workers, have their circadian clocks disrupted. As a rule, managers have to plan shift work so that workers will get an adequate amount of time for work and rest.

Compared to an 8-hour day shift, night shift (11 PM to 6 AM) work time is decreased from 8 to 7 hours. A worker can also agree to a 12 AM — 5 AM schedule, if necessary. Despite missing five work hours a week compared to their daytime colleagues, night-shift employees receive the same 40-hour-week salary. Night shift staff can be called in for extra hours of work, but do no more than 8 hours in 24 hours.

16-17-year-old staff members are forbidden from working between 12 and 4 AM. However, such workers are allowed to work from 10 PM to 6 AM if they are hired by hotels, retail shops, or hospitals. There are no limitations to night shift schedule hours for hospitals, emergency services, TV, and radio stations.

Many workers who have to make a transition from a morning to an evening shift experience exhaustion, insomnia, changes in weight and appetite. It takes them too much time to cope with new daily waking and sleeping hours, however, there are tricks that make this process less painful for inexperienced workers.

How to get a good night’s sleep when working late evening shift hours

In order to painlessly transition between shifts, the body has to be prepared for the coming changes. If an employee switches between morning and evening shifts, the time of waking up and going to bed has to be prolonged or shortened. When an employee switches from a morning to a night shift schedule, they have to wake up and go to bed an hour later for a couple of days. In order to painlessly transition from night to morning working hours, employees have to wake up and go to bed an hour earlier for a couple of days.

Whenever your work begins, a good night’s sleep is a guarantee of a productive day at the job. In general, workers have to sleep at least 6 hours a day to feel well-rested. Those working the night shift have a hard time achieving this goal due to the fact that our bodies are designed to be active during the daytime. The solution to this problem is adapting the environment to that of the night-time.

First and foremost, one should block out all of the noises. Switching off your smartphone, doorbell, and TV is a must. If you are accustomed to sleeping with the white noise on, you may purchase good noise-cancelling headphones under 200 pounds to eliminate surrounding sounds interfering with your sleep. It will also work better if the bedroom is located in the quietest place of the home. Having soundproof windows with good isolation will make it easier to isolate any outdoor noise. It is also good to tell friends and neighbours about your new sleeping schedule so that they don’t call you accidentally during those hours.

It is also important to make the room as dark as possible even when the sun is shining brightly outside. Covering windows with pitch-black curtains is a good solution. Avoid eating or drinking before going to bed. Make it a habit of not taking alcohol or caffeine a couple of hours before going to bed. A good read, a hot shower/bath will make it easier for your body to relax and fall asleep.

How shift work changes appetite

The changes in circadian rhythm affect the body’s sleeping as well as eating patterns. Irregular or excessive food consumption, especially at night-time, makes workers feel fatigued and restless. Both their productivity and health suffer as a result.

There are several tips for surviving the night shift with minimum risk of developing gastrointestinal diseases or gaining excess weight. Before going to work, it is important to have the biggest meal of the day. That way you will be energised and ready to take on the day. 6 PM is the best time to have that meal for those working late at night.

What to eat during night shift work

Suffering from drowsiness and fatigue seems to be one of the most common side effects of working the night shift. These feelings can be dealt with by sticking to a healthy diet. During night shifts it is better for workers to focus on high-protein food, including tuna, chicken, tofu, eggs, low-fat cheese. These products will keep employees alert and focused.

They can be combined into nutritious snacks an employee can bring to work. For example, you can pack some brown rice salad with chicken breast and tofu or a dietary vegetable and bean soup. You can also keep hunger at bay with hazelnuts, apples, Greek yoghurt, almonds, carrots, and hummus, which are all perfectly good and healthy choices.

It is also necessary to drink enough water during the night shifts. An adequate amount of liquid will make you less dependent on coffee or sweets as sources of alertness and energy. Sugar-free black and herbal tea, fresh vegetable juices and cold water are all nice choices for hydration.

What to avoid during night shift work

Eating high-carbohydrate shortly before or during the night shift is a foolproof way of getting yourself drowsy and unproductive. Things like potatoes, bread or cereals sedate and relax workers, making it harder for them to pull through the night shift.

Sweetened beverages and food that is high in sugar content can be just as harmful. A soda or a candy bar may seem like good sources of energy at first, but this kind of snack will make you sleepy a couple of hours later. Not to mention that during the night time a human body can’t process sugar effectively.

Too much caffeine is another health threat for night shift workers. It’s OK to drink several cups of coffee at the beginning of a night shift, but consuming it over the whole duration can cause insomnia and other sleeping disorders. Your daily dose shouldn’t be more than 400 mg of caffeine (four small cups).

We hope that night shift workers will find the listed advice helpful.

Technologies are designed to make our lives easier, and in terms of business operations, WFM software fully aligns with this statement. Do you know what this exceptional type of software product is? Perhaps you want to launch WFM scheduling software to ensure the flawless operation of your staff and business as a whole, but you are still unsure how to proceed. Then, our article may be helpful for you.

What is Contact Centre Workforce Management?

Contact centre workforce management (WFM) is a strategic approach to optimising staffing, scheduling, and overall workforce efficiency in call centres. It ensures that the right number of agents with the necessary skills are available at the right time to handle customer interactions. Effective workforce management call centre solutions utilise AI-driven analytics, forecasting, and automation to enhance both employee performance and customer satisfaction.

The core elements of contact centre workforce management include:

• Forecasting – Predicting call volume trends to plan staffing needs.
• Managing – Monitoring agent performance and workload distribution.
• Scheduling – Creating optimised shift schedules to maintain service levels.

By implementing a structured call centre workforce management solution, businesses can reduce costs, improve agent engagement, and enhance customer experiences.

Forecasting

Accurate call centre workforce management forecasting is the foundation of effective WFM call centre operations. It involves analysing historical data, seasonal trends, and real-time demand to predict customer interactions. Key forecasting methods include:

• Time-Series Analysis – Using past call volume patterns to predict future demand.
• Workload Forecasting – Determining staffing requirements based on anticipated customer interactions across multiple channels (calls, emails, live chat, etc.).
• AI-Powered Forecasting – Leveraging machine learning algorithms to refine workforce predictions dynamically.

A well-structured workforce management call centre scheduling process prevents overstaffing (which increases costs) and understaffing (which leads to long wait times and poor customer experiences).

Managing

Managing workforce management in call centre operations involves:

• Tracking Real-Time Agent Performance – Monitoring call resolution rates, handle times, and productivity metrics.
• Optimising Agent Utilisation – Ensuring fair work distribution to prevent burnout and improve job satisfaction.
• Ensuring Compliance – Adhering to labour laws, break schedules, and overtime regulations.

With a workforce management contact centre system, managers can proactively identify bottlenecks, staffing inefficiencies, and training needs, ensuring smooth call centre operations.

Scheduling

Proper workforce management and call centre scheduling ensures that agents are assigned shifts that align with call volume patterns while maintaining work-life balance. Best practices include:

• Automated Scheduling Software – Using AI to create optimised shift plans based on agent skills, availability, and demand.
• Flexible Shift Models – Offering split shifts, hybrid work models, and self-scheduling options to improve employee satisfaction.
• Dynamic Scheduling Adjustments – Adapting schedules in real-time to handle unexpected spikes in call volume.

A well-executed call centre workforce planning strategy boosts productivity, reduces absenteeism, and improves agent retention.

How Does Workforce Management Work?

The main idea of workforce management software is to boost your staff’s operations and ensure that your human resources are utilised optimally according to their job roles, skills, and a certain schedule which should be maintained to streamline the whole workflow.

Typically, the WFM tool varies according to the requirements of the industry and the niche it is applied. Yet in general, the main duties you can handle with this type of software are as follows:

• Development of successful and effective schedules for your employees in an automated mode.
• Time management – namely, tracking your staff’s clock-ins and clock-outs, work hours, days off, sick leave, etc.
• Regulatory compliance – that’s what typical WFM software helps to regulate and implement in the company’s regiment.

That’s the core, and it can be accompanied by additional features and tasks a particular business needs. For instance, you can get a WFM application that can be used on multiple devices, apply labour forecasting tools integrated into it, or add some analytics tools and reports to the product to get clear and accurate analytics for further development of a company.

All these features depend on the ideas of software developers mostly, and there are multiple products in the markets from basic free WFM software to more sophisticated and complex products offered on a paid basis.

Why Is Workforce Management So Important for Call Centres?

Effective workforce management in a call centre ensures that customer service teams operate efficiently, cost-effectively, and with high employee engagement. Without a structured contact centre WFM strategy, call centres face inconsistent service levels, high turnover rates, and unnecessary labour costs.

Key reasons why workforce management call centre is essential:

• Maintains Service Levels – Ensures customers receive timely responses with minimal wait times.
• Optimises Employee Performance – Helps agents stay productive without experiencing burnout.
• Improves Customer Experience – Satisfied agents provide better service.
• Controls Labour Costs – Prevents overstaffing and unnecessary expenses.
• Boosts Agent Morale – Fair scheduling leads to happier employees.

A contact centre workforce management strategy aligns business goals with employee well-being, resulting in smoother operations and improved customer satisfaction.

WFM’s Role in a Contact Centre

Call centre WFM plays a crucial role in maintaining operational efficiency by addressing:

• Staffing Needs – Ensuring the correct number of agents are available per shift.
• Call Routing Optimisation – Assigning the best-suited agents to specific customer interactions.
• Performance Monitoring – Tracking agent activity to identify areas for improvement.
• Schedule Compliance – Ensuring adherence to allocated shifts and break times.

By leveraging call centre workforce management systems, businesses can streamline operations and improve service levels.

Why Use Call Centre WFM Tools?

Adopting workforce management software call centre solutions provides better scheduling, real-time monitoring, and workforce analytics. These tools are designed to:

Maintaining Service Levels

• Ensures the correct number of agents are scheduled based on call volume predictions.
• Reduces abandoned calls, long wait times, and agent fatigue.
• Helps maintain customer service KPIs, such as first-call resolution (FCR) and response times.

Optimising Employee Performance

• Provides data-driven insights into agent workload, call handling efficiency, and peak productivity hours.
• Identifies training needs to improve call quality and response accuracy.
• Prevents overworking employees by balancing workloads effectively.

Better Customer Experience

• Improves call routing by assigning the right agent to the right task.
• Reduces customer wait times, increasing satisfaction and loyalty.
• Ensures consistent service quality across all shifts and time zones.

Optimising Labour Costs

• Prevents overstaffing during low-demand periods, saving payroll costs.
• Reduces overtime expenses by ensuring proper shift planning.
• Maximises workforce utilisation for higher ROI on labour investment.

Boosting Agent Morale

• Provides predictable schedules that align with employee preferences.
• Reduces burnout by ensuring reasonable workloads and rest breaks.
• Increases retention by creating a positive work environment.

Implementing contact centre workforce management software ensures better control over staffing, compliance, and service quality, leading to higher productivity and reduced operational costs.

Key Features of Call Centre Workforce Management

A well-structured workforce management call centre strategy depends on advanced tools and features that ensure accurate scheduling, real-time monitoring, and operational efficiency. Modern contact centre workforce management software includes functionalities designed to optimise agent performance, control labour costs, and enhance customer service levels.

Here are the key features that make call centre workforce management systems effective:

Staff Forecasting and Scheduling

One of the most critical aspects of workforce management in call centre operations is accurate forecasting. By analysing historical data, seasonal trends, and real-time demand, businesses can:

• Predict call volume fluctuations and adjust staffing levels accordingly.
• Schedule agents efficiently to prevent overstaffing or understaffing.
• Improve service levels by aligning the correct number of employees with expected workloads.

With AI-powered workforce management call centre scheduling, managers can automate

Consistent Customer Experiences

A structured call centre workforce planning approach ensures that:

• Customers receive fast and efficient support, regardless of the time of day.
• Service levels remain consistent across all shifts and channels (phone, email, chat, social media).
• Agents are properly allocated to handle high-demand periods.

By integrating call centre workforce optimisation tools, businesses enhance customer loyalty and satisfaction.

Agent Job Satisfaction and Engagement

A workforce call centre strategy isn’t just about productivity — it also focuses on agent well-being. The best workforce management contact centre tools provide:

• Flexible scheduling options that give employees control over their shifts.
• Fair workload distribution, preventing stress and burnout.
• Employee feedback mechanisms to keep agents engaged and motivated.

High agent engagement leads to lower turnover rates and a more efficient call centre workforce.

AI-Optimised Schedules

Artificial intelligence plays a significant role in call centre workforce management by:

• Predicting peak and slow periods with high accuracy.
• Adjusting schedules dynamically based on real-time call volume.
• Optimising break times to ensure continuous coverage without disrupting service.

With AI-driven call centre workforce management solutions, businesses reduce manual scheduling efforts and improve overall efficiency.

Shift Bidding

Allowing agents to bid for shifts based on their availability and preferences improves:

• Work-life balance, making schedules more flexible.
• Employee satisfaction, leading to better retention.
• Fair shift distribution, ensuring all employees get opportunities for desirable shifts.

Shift bidding is a key feature in modern workforce management software call centre solutions.

Time and Attendance Tracking

Tracking work schedule adherence is essential for:

• Ensuring employees clock in and out on time.
• Managing absenteeism and identifying trends.
• Preventing excessive overtime and labour law violations.

By integrating time-tracking features, managers maintain full visibility into workforce efficiency.

Real-Time Team Management

A workforce management call centre solution must allow supervisors to:

• Monitor agent activity in real time.
• Identify and address workload imbalances before they affect service levels.
• Make live schedule adjustments to handle unexpected demand surges.

This feature ensures that managers can respond instantly to any scheduling or staffing issues.

Operational Efficiency

Using workforce management in a call centre improves operational workflows by:

• Reducing manual scheduling efforts, saving time and resources.
• Optimising shift coverage to maintain consistent service levels.
• Enhancing workforce productivity, ensuring better customer interactions.

With the right call centre WFM tools, businesses run more efficiently and cost-effectively.

Budget Savings

A properly managed workforce management call centre strategy leads to:

• Lower labour costs by preventing overstaffing and unnecessary overtime.
• More efficient resource allocation, reducing wasted payroll expenses.
• Better financial planning, ensuring labour budgets are aligned with revenue goals.

Companies that use contact centre workforce management software cut costs while improving service delivery.

Reporting and Analytics

Data-driven insights are essential for continuous improvement. A strong workforce management call centre system provides:

• Performance tracking for individual agents and teams.
• Detailed workforce reports to optimise shift planning.
• AI-driven analytics to improve forecasting and staffing decisions.

With robust reporting tools, businesses make informed scheduling decisions that drive better results.

Benefits of Workforce Management Software

Investing in workforce management software call centre solutions significantly enhances operational efficiency, employee satisfaction, and customer service quality. These systems automate complex tasks, improve accuracy, and provide data-driven insights for better decision-making.

Here are the top benefits of contact centre workforce management software:

1. Increased Accuracy in Scheduling and Forecasting

Using AI-driven workforce management call centre forecasting, businesses can:

• Predict call volume fluctuations with precision.
• Reduce scheduling errors that lead to overstaffing or understaffing.
• Ensure optimal workforce distribution based on demand trends.

Accurate scheduling improves productivity, ensuring agents are available when they are needed most.

2. Reduce the Amount of Time Spent Scheduling

Manual scheduling is time-consuming and prone to human error. A call centre workforce management solution automates:

• Shift assignments, ensuring fair and balanced work distribution.
• Break and lunch scheduling, optimising agent availability.
• Last-minute schedule adjustments, handling unforeseen absences seamlessly.

By eliminating manual scheduling tasks, managers save time and focus on improving customer service strategies.

3. Ensure Schedule Adherence

A contact centre workforce management system ensures:

• Agents follow their assigned work schedules.
• Breaks and lunch periods comply with company policies and labour laws.
• Real-time alerts notify managers of schedule deviations.

Adhering to schedules and policies leads to higher service consistency and regulatory compliance.

4. Understand Where Agents Need Extra Support

A strong workforce management call centre system tracks:

• Performance gaps, identifying agents who may need additional training.
• Workload distribution, ensuring no employee is overworked or underutilised.
• Real-time agent productivity, allowing for quick adjustments.

By analysing workforce data, businesses can implement targeted training and coaching programmes.

5. Create a Better Agent Experience

Happy agents deliver better customer service. Workforce management solutions help:

• Provide fair and flexible scheduling that aligns with agent preferences.
• Reduce stress and burnout by balancing workloads.
• Offer self-scheduling features, giving employees more control over their shifts.

A better work-life balance leads to higher job satisfaction and lower turnover rates.

6. Promote Regulatory Compliance

Labour laws and compliance requirements vary across industries and locations. Workforce management in a call centre ensures:

• Adherence to work-hour limits and overtime regulations.
• Automated break and lunch scheduling to comply with labour laws.
• Accurate tracking of hours worked, preventing payroll discrepancies.

By maintaining compliance with legal requirements, businesses avoid penalties and improve workforce transparency.

Call Centre Workforce Management Best Practices

Implementing call centre workforce management best practices ensures that call centres operate efficiently, cost-effectively, and with high employee engagement. By optimising scheduling, leveraging technology, and maintaining agent satisfaction, businesses can enhance service levels while reducing operational costs.

Below are the most effective best practices for workforce management call centre operations:

1. Choose the Right WFM Software

Selecting the right workforce management software call centre is critical for accurate forecasting, real-time scheduling, and performance tracking. Key factors to consider:

• AI-driven scheduling capabilities to automate and optimise workforce allocation.
• Real-time monitoring to track agent adherence and workload balance.
• Self-service options that allow employees to swap or request shifts.
• Analytics and reporting features to improve decision-making.

With contact centre workforce management software, businesses can enhance productivity and optimise resource allocation.

2. Schedule the Right Agents at the Right Time

Proper scheduling prevents staffing shortages and excessive overtime costs. To optimise workforce management in a call centre, companies should:

• Leverage In-Depth Analytics. Use historical data and AI-based forecasting to predict call volumes, peak hours, and seasonal trends.
• Empower Your Employees. Allow agents to request preferred shifts while ensuring coverage for critical time slots.
• Build a Knowledge Base. Provide training and resources to enhance agent skills and improve scheduling efficiency.
• Empower Employees with Self-Service. Enable shift swaps and availability updates through a workforce call centre management system.
• Continuous Learning. Offer ongoing training programmes to improve agent efficiency and adaptability.
• Don’t Forget About Shrinkage. Factor in absenteeism, breaks, and meeting times to ensure full shift coverage.
• Be Adaptable. Use real-time scheduling tools to adjust shifts dynamically based on demand fluctuations.

By applying these scheduling strategies, businesses maximise workforce efficiency and agent productivity.

3. Help Keep Agent Morale High and Prevent Burnout

Agent wellbeing and engagement directly impact customer service quality. To maintain high morale, managers should:

Provide Schedule Predictability or Autonomy

• Give employees advance notice of shift schedules to improve work-life balance.
• Offer flexible scheduling options, such as hybrid work models or shift bidding.

Keep Agents Engaged

• Implement gamification to make daily tasks more interactive and rewarding.
• Foster a positive work environment with recognition programmes.

Show Appreciation for Great Work

• Provide incentives and bonuses for top-performing agents.
• Recognise hard work and achievements to boost motivation.

A positive workplace culture leads to lower turnover rates and higher service quality.

4. Let AI Take the Grunt Work

AI-powered workforce management call centre scheduling tools eliminate manual errors and streamline operations by:

• Automating demand-based scheduling to prevent overstaffing and understaffing.
• Optimising agent assignments based on performance, skills, and customer needs.
• Improving workforce flexibility with real-time shift adjustments.

With AI-driven workforce management contact centre solutions, businesses enhance efficiency and reduce administrative workload.

5. Incorporate Employee (and Customer) Feedback

Listening to both employees and customers helps refine workforce management strategies. Best practices include:

• Conducting regular employee surveys to identify scheduling challenges.
• Using customer feedback to assess service levels and adjust staffing accordingly.
• Implementing workforce management call centre job reviews to improve agent performance and satisfaction.

Integrating feedback into call centre workforce management solutions leads to better agent experiences and higher customer satisfaction rates.

How Software Can Support Your Call Centre Workforce Management

Adopting workforce management software call centre solutions simplifies staff scheduling, real-time monitoring, and performance tracking. Advanced contact centre workforce management software automates forecasting, shift planning, and compliance tracking, ensuring businesses optimise resources while maintaining high service levels.

Here’s how call centre workforce management systems support efficient operations:

Track KPIs and Metrics

Measuring key performance indicators (KPIs) allows businesses to improve workforce management call centre strategies. Essential KPIs include:

• Call Volume Trends – Tracks fluctuations in incoming customer requests to refine forecasting.
• First-Call Resolution (FCR) – Measures how effectively agents resolve issues in a single interaction.
• Schedule Adherence – Ensures employees follow assigned shifts and break schedules.
• Occupancy Rate – Determines agent productivity levels to prevent overwork or underutilisation.
• Customer Satisfaction Scores (CSAT) – Evaluates service quality and agent performance.

By analysing real-time data, businesses can continuously optimise workforce operations.

Automate Schedule Adherence and Approvals

Automating workforce management in a call centre ensures schedule consistency by:

• Enforcing work-hour limits to prevent excessive overtime.
• Managing shift swaps while maintaining adequate coverage.
• Automating break scheduling to comply with labour laws.
• Providing real-time adherence alerts to help managers address issues proactively.

With workforce management call centre scheduling tools, managers can reduce scheduling conflicts and improve compliance.

Enable Skills-Based Routing

Effective workforce management contact centre strategies include skill-based call routing, which:

• Matches customers with the most qualified agents, improving first-contact resolution.
• Enhances operational efficiency by directing specialised enquiries to expert teams.
• Reduces call transfer rates, leading to faster response times and improved customer satisfaction.

With AI-powered workforce call centre solutions, businesses increase efficiency while optimising agent workload distribution.

Use Predictive Forecasting

Call centre workforce forecasting tools analyse historical trends, real-time demand, and seasonal fluctuations to:

• Adjust staffing levels dynamically based on predicted workload.
• Prevent overstaffing during low-demand periods, reducing labour costs.
• Ensure peak demand is met with adequate agent coverage.

By leveraging predictive analytics, businesses improve workforce allocation and service consistency.

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How Shifton Can Help with Workforce Management Call Centre Solutions

Shifton is a cloud-based service designed for employee shift planning and scheduling. It helps businesses efficiently manage workforce schedules, reduce administrative workload, and improve shift coordination. Key benefits include:

• Automated Shift Planning – Quickly creates optimised work schedules, ensuring fair shift distribution.
• Real-Time Adjustments – Allows managers to modify schedules instantly to accommodate staffing needs.
• Self-Scheduling Features – Enables employees to bid for shifts, request swaps, and set availability preferences.
• Flexible Scheduling Options – Supports fixed, rotating, and part-time shifts, making workforce management more adaptable.
• Compliance Support – Helps businesses structure shifts according to labour laws and company policies.

With Shifton’s intuitive scheduling platform, businesses can streamline workforce planning, improve team coordination, and maintain seamless shift operations.

Automation can be applied to nearly everything, even in the niche of security services, where aside from special security monitoring tools, you can also utilise security guard scheduling software to enhance your company’s efficiency and elevate it to the highest levels.

In Shifton, we have numerous successful cases of implementing security guard management software, and we are happy to share with the readers of our blog some insights and benefits of such a technical solution.

What is Security Guard Scheduling Software?

The core idea of security scheduling software is to optimise your human resources to ensure they operate with maximum efficiency. In the context of a security department or a company offering security services and bodyguarding services, this product addresses the following issues:

• Correct scheduling to provide fair and clear shifts for everyone working in your company. You can create schedules and share them with your staff immediately in a single environment to inform them, or even allow them to select when to work and which shifts to accept.
• Preventing overworking. This tool assists management in avoiding overloading some of its workers while others may remain unoccupied and earn less.
• Control the time of your staff. Specifically, in Shifton, we employ GPS in our security staff scheduling software and allow a business owner or a manager responsible to monitor each worker’s clock-ins and clock-outs, their absence from a workplace, or issues arising from lateness.
• Correct accounting processes. In the security service business, there are multiple features to consider when calculating payroll. With the aid of an adjusted security guard schedule template, you can compute salaries in the automated mode, add bonuses or penalties for each employee, and effortlessly dispatch ready-made tables with payroll calculations to your accounting department.

How Does Security Guard Scheduling Software Work?

Of course, each security scheduling software might have its peculiar characteristics regarding its functions, but typically, it operates in the same manner.

• You have an environment your employees can access where you create schedules by utilising pre-set templates or by developing your own template.
• You can easily fill in the form and distribute work shifts and hours among your workers.
• When it’s time to calculate payroll, the platform automatically counts work hours for each employee and generates a table or a report you can use for further payroll processes.
• In case your software is also security guard tracking software, it provides special tools to indicate work hours and enable your workers to signal when they start and end their shifts.

That’s a concise explanation of any security guard scheduling software. However, if you want it to be most effective and provide you with advanced functionality, you can derive all those advantages from Shifton.

Shifton Best Security Guard Scheduling Software of 2024

Why do we assert Shifton is the best security guard management software? There are numerous reasons for that. Generally, the core features making our product the #1 in the market for security service agencies and security departments are as follows:

• Built-in scenarios and templates for successful scheduling of workflow in the agency. We provide customers with numerous templates that suit various types of business and hiring models, thus, you can adjust them to your particular workflow.
• Special task module, which offers broad opportunities to assign tasks besides creating schedules and shifts. This multifactor assignment module helps to monitor who and when is in charge and has to take up the shift, and simultaneously assign tasks that should be completed during the shift.
• Easy and flexible changes in shifts. In case of an emergency or an extra situation, you can change shifts, provide replacements in shifts, and at the same time, you get immediate information about the number of work hours of each worker to prevent overworking.
• Instant communication with your staff. Shifton offers simple communication with the entire staff using built-in tools of the application. You can promptly inform your workers about changes, receive their feedback, and contact them via the app when your personnel is in the field.
• Alert tools that help to deliver your messages to the staff instantaneously with seamless control of them receiving the messages.
• Advanced payroll tools that offer a complex calculation of salaries, including the application of special scenarios for bonus accounting and penalties.
• Tracking tools help to monitor the performance of tasks, shift-taking, and timely arrivals.

That’s the basic kit we offer, and aside from it, you can use that tool for forecasting, analytics, and planning. There are multiple integrated report forms and analytic tools you gain access to.

Understanding the Value of Security Guard Scheduling Software

Yet, what’s particularly special in security scheduling software to make it indispensable for niche businesses? Let’s consider the most impactful benefits.

Optimised Coverage for Security Goals

Nothing can be worse than understaffing in the security business. If you fail to provide enough guards to achieve the highest security levels, you lose more than a client; you also jeopardise your good reputation. With the help of special security scheduling software, you can plan your security coverage and engage as many people as you need for impeccable performance.

Improved Visibility and Accountability

Shifton, as an example of security management software, provides the highest level of visibility and accountability. You no longer need to write plans and check them in the office. Instead, you instantly see schedules and current tasks for each employee, you know who is in the field right now and who is on their day off. You do not need to spend time on calls and clarifying the current state of affairs. You simply launch the app and get instant information about everything concerning your personnel.

Lower Scheduling Overhead

Save your time on scheduling and accounting for multiple details. That can be done automatically by your security scheduling software. Even the most complex rules and calculations are carried out error-free with the help of software.

Real-Time Monitoring

Tracking the workflow in real-time is invaluable. Thus, you can react promptly to new circumstances, plan in advance further routines, and receive instant information about emergencies, delays, or any additional situations. So, you can mitigate them promptly to maintain streamlined operations.

Improved Communication

The core element in any business is clear and fast communication between team members and managers. That’s why using security guard management software helps to maintain communication in the fastest and most convenient mode. You can get instant feedback from your guards about the completion of their tasks, receive information about required schedule changes from employees who cannot pick up the shift, or notify your staff about anything you want with guaranteed alerts for everyone.

These features implemented in the new-generation technical background by Shifton help businesses engaged in security services comply with their goals and provide clients with impeccable levels of service. Besides, such software reduces costs and time expenses for CEOs to help them focus on more important matters instead of constantly monitoring, informing, and scheduling their staff.

Being a hotelier or a CEO in the hospitality business provides you with multiple duties, challenges, and emergencies which can be surmounted using employee management software for hotels. It’s no secret that a large proportion of processes in any hotel are related to mutual communication with your staff. In hotels, you typically have many employees. Even if it is a family business, you cannot run it alone.

This fact leads to another: most difficulties and blunders you may face when trying to get your hotel business established occur due to a lack of timely and effective communication between you and your staff. At Shifton, we clearly understand that and can help you cope with such situations by sharing our experience and hotel scheduling software.

How to manage hotel staff: keys for success

Your staff should work seamlessly because your hotel’s reputation and your clients’ loyalty significantly depend on their operation. This means you should consider all possible challenges that could undermine all the efforts you make to create a flawless hotel. You particularly need to consider:

• Lack of communication between your employees and teams.
• Difficulties with shift scheduling and, thus, arising problems with customer service.
• Low flexibility in staff management which leads to staff shortages over time.
• Poorly developed task management.
• Lack of motivation and an ineffective system of rewards and punishments.

Besides your efforts to mitigate these issues, employee management software for hotels may come in handy in monitoring and adjusting your staff’s operations. Save time by considering communication channels to reach out to your staff promptly, but first, analyse which issues arise regularly in your operations in order to address them.

Communication issues in the hospitality industry

The first and foremost thing you need to provide is communication in the hotel industry. You need your managers to book rooms for clients in a timely manner and inform maids about which rooms need to be cleaned. You need to get timely information about who starts the shift today and who will come in for the shift tomorrow. Your bartenders have to inform about what supplies they need for the bar, and the security service has to provide timely reports. That’s just the tip of the iceberg, and communication forms the basis for success. What happens when it is lacking?

• The entire operation can fall into chaos.
• Customers remain unsatisfied and may leave negative reviews on your work.
• Staff shortages are inevitable.
• You lose money and good workers, rather than making them more motivated.

Sounds disheartening, doesn’t it? Yet, you need just one thing besides your time to keep hotels running smoothly. That’s staff scheduling software for hotels, which helps to address multiple issues simultaneously.

Automation of staff management and planning

When you get Shifton’s employee management software for hotels, you acquire an all-purpose tool.

1. Your staff won’t miss their shifts or overwork due to a GPS-powered time clock that helps them to clock in and out directly from their mobile devices.
2. You create schedules for all teams as simply as possible with integrated hotel employee schedule templates.
3. You receive instant information about your establishment’s operation via automated reporting in the software.
4. You make daily tasks and operations more streamlined, making time management more effective in this case.
5. Automated human resources tasks assist you with a more efficient and personalised hiring and onboarding process.
6. You get a framework for communication and information within your staff where employees can access important information while on the go, as Shifton functions as employee mobile apps for hotels.
7. Receiving feedback from your staff is essential, and you have a digital social feed that promotes employee engagement and collaboration.
8. Seamless payroll and accounting integration with QuickBooks Online – that’s what helps you to calculate salaries fairly and quickly and motivates good employees automatically.

How to improve the management of a work team?

Efficient team management in the hospitality industry can make all the difference in customer satisfaction and overall business success. With Shifton, you can use the following tips and enjoy the results almost instantly.

• Use special scheduling templates i.e., 2/2, 3/3, 1/3, 5/2 to create effective working shifts and allocate your staff logically and efficiently.
• Use the Tasks tool to assign tasks to employees, track their completion, create checklists for maids and cooks, for example, and check task statuses instantly to ensure everything is progressing well. This streamlines operations and helps to make task management work to your advantage.
• Notify your staff via their mobile apps. By operating within a common framework, your employees will receive automatic push notifications and reminders, ensuring they never miss them.
• Provide greater flexibility by allowing shifts, weekends, and sick days to be exchanged online. Your staff will appreciate it if you respond swiftly to their emergent needs for replacements or sick days. Your business will benefit too.
• Motivate your employees with overtime bonuses. They can be calculated automatically as Shifton calculates each employee’s working hours and provides clear reports on who has worked overtime today.
• Manage breaks so that they do not harm your business. Create pre-scheduled breaks or set limits on the number and duration of breaks.
• Monitor attendance and receive timely information on when a person actually starts and ends their shift, or who was late or missed a shift.

These tips can make managing a hotel easy, even if your team consists of over 100 employees.

Employee management software for hospitality

With robust employee management software for hotels, you can schedule employees more efficiently and replace them flexibly in case of an emergency.

• Assign staff shifts based on job role and availability.
• Use drag and drop, assign shifts in bulk, create recurring shifts, produce customisable templates, and even allow employees to claim open shifts available.
• Easily resolve scheduling issues with alerts for overtime, limitations, or scheduling conflicts.
• Provide push notifications for employees to enable them to immediately accept or reject shifts directly from their mobile devices.
• Include shift tasks, notes, and even files within the schedule, so employees know exactly what to do upon arrival at work.
• Complete oversight over collaborative staff scheduling in real-time, all while on the go.

Communication is the foundation of effective hotel management. Yet, providing it can be a complex task. Thanks to modern automation tools, you can delegate part of the communication and interaction processes with your staff to these solutions. Today, Shifton offers hotel businesses a versatile automation tool that aids with staff management, shift management, emergency solutions, recruiting, and motivating your team. Just choose it and use it to achieve success with this employee mobile app for hotels.

The team at Shifton continues to enhance a tool for selecting and deploying medical staff for shifts, introducing the nurse schedule template. There is no longer any doubt that efficient planning plays a crucial role in healthcare, ensuring that hospitals and clinics operate smoothly. Let’s discuss how a chosen nurse scheduling app or template aids in online schedule planning.

Nurse Schedule Templates: What Are They?

Nurse schedule templates are akin to the backbone of the hospital nurse shift management system. They’re pre-made documents that assist managers in planning when their nursing teams work. These schedules cover a variety of shifts, from day to night. Additionally, they take into account each staff member’s preferences, such as when they are available, to ensure everyone is content and the schedule runs smoothly.

How Do Nurse Schedule Templates Enhance Hospital and Clinic Management?

Nurse schedule templates are extremely vital for the smooth running of hospitals and clinics. Many healthcare facilities are adopting them to simplify nurse staffing schedules, and here’s why:

No Mess: These templates help reduce errors in scheduling so you don’t find yourself short-staffed and scrambling to cover shifts. Managers can easily identify gaps or overlaps and address them to ensure there’s always sufficient cover.

Time Saver: Utilising healthcare staff scheduling templates or apps saves a significant amount of time compared to creating schedules from scratch each week. Modify a pre-made template or update an app instead.

Happy Nurses: Nursing is challenging, so keeping nurses satisfied is essential. Using these templates ensures nurses have clear, fair schedules they can plan around. That results in a happier, more productive team.

Transparency: Managing nurse scheduler apps and templates also makes schedules more transparent. Everyone can see who’s working when, so there’s no perception of preferential treatment. It’s all about teamwork and ensuring patients receive excellent care.

How to Create a Nurse Schedule Template

While countless templates are available online for staff scheduling, creating your own is straightforward — easier than you might expect. It’s a one-off task that will save you time in the long run. Here are 5 simple steps for you to follow:

1. Choose a platform. Use Excel, Google Sheets, or online nurse scheduling software.
2. Personalise the template with your organisation’s details and staff names.
3. If necessary, include hourly rates for staff.
4. Populate the schedule based on staff availability, ensuring everyone’s workload is balanced.
5. Share the schedule with your team, controlling who can edit it as needed.
   

Enhancing Nurse Shift Schedules: 6 Helpful Tips

Healthcare organisations need to enhance their nurse scheduling to improve clinical and business outcomes. Crafting a nurse shift schedule is just the beginning; to make it work for everyone, consider these six tips:

Use Nurse Scheduling Software

Nurse scheduling software is excellent because it keeps everything clear and transparent, so your team always knows when and where they work. Say goodbye to old-fashioned Excel sheets and try shift scheduling software like Shifton. It simplifies scheduling, even with the medical staff’s complex and ever-changing schedules. Plus, it handles time-off requests and keeps track of attendance and payroll — all in one convenient location.

Consider What Your Staff Want

When organising schedules, consider your nursing team’s preferences. It’s an easy way to keep them happy, boost their morale, and retain them. Some people prefer specific shifts, while others might wish to avoid working on certain days. Accommodating these preferences will make your team happier and less likely to leave.

Have Backup Plans

Life is unpredictable, so be prepared for emergencies. While it’s unfortunate, these things happen, and they can disrupt the shift schedule, especially during significant hospital shift changes. It’s advantageous to have an on-call nurse who can always step in when needed, as many clinics do.

Keep Your Schedule Updated

Don’t let your schedule become outdated. Ensure you keep an eye on the nurse’s schedule and refresh it periodically. That way, it stays current with any changes in staff availability, hospital needs, etc. The last thing you want is for your team to refer to an outdated schedule, miss shifts, or arrive late, disrupting the entire nurse shift change routine.

Give Your Nurses Some Rest

Ensure your nurses have adequate rest between shifts to recharge. When nurses don’t get enough sleep, they’re more likely to experience needlestick injuries and face health issues like hypertension, obesity, diabetes, depression, and heart problems. Moreover, working long hours can lead to compassion fatigue. That’s why it’s crucial to automate shift planning. Smart shift scheduling software can handle scheduling without errors, unlike humans, who can make mistakes.

Good Communication Is Key

Keeping your team informed about their schedules is essential to keeping everyone content and avoiding mix-ups. Want to maintain positive team morale? Always keep them updated about what’s happening and any upcoming changes. Using a nurse scheduling app where everyone can quickly check in? That’s a brilliant idea!

Final Thoughts

Using nurse staffing software simplifies managing your workload and boosts productivity. When this critical task isn’t executed well, it can cause difficulties for nurses, nurse leaders, hospitals, and patients. Poor scheduling can also lead to nurse dissatisfaction and cost hospitals significantly in overtime pay. That’s where Shifton comes in! As a nurse manager, ensuring your nursing staff is well-organised is vital to facilitate seamless patient care.

With Shifton, you can:

• Easily organise and oversee your nursing team to ensure adequate coverage.
• Monitor patient care tasks, such as medication administration and procedures.
• Coordinate and communicate with your team effortlessly.

Bid farewell to the headaches of manual scheduling. Everyone’s heard about it — in 2024, nurse scheduling apps will be launching. They’re all about making shift planning easier, reducing paperwork, and helping nurses balance work and life.

Give Shifton software a try today for smoother nursing management.

Following the schedule is one of the most important things in any company’s working process. Professionals need to value their time and use it effectively during working hours. Workers can benefit from the following advice to make their work less hectic.

Knowing your limits is one of the simplest time management tips

Don’t be afraid to speak to your management if you encounter difficulties. It’s better to clarify things from the outset than wait until the situation spirals out of control. For example, if you need to book a hotel for a business trip, ensure that you reserve the correct number of rooms with the hotel being in the right part of town. You should also enquire about any financial limits.

You can’t always handle everything by yourself. There is no shame in asking for help from your colleagues. If you are given a task you can’t manage, you can allocate work among some of your colleagues. This can be done if, for instance, you are tasked with front-end development on an entire website. You can delegate the work on a couple of pages to fellow developers. This way you will save yourself from unnecessary fatigue and increase the likelihood of completing the assignment on time.

Don’t loiter your time away

Whatever happens, you should stay focused on your responsibilities. Don’t leap out of your chair the moment you see your boss leave the office. Focus on your work instead of aimlessly wandering around the office and chatting with co-workers. We advise that you create a detailed work plan to keep yourself on track.

Try to keep away from distractions. There is nothing wrong with calling our friends and loved ones from time to time. However, this practice can turn into a bad habit if the phone calls and texting get out of control.

Organise your working space

Respecting your work desk has to be one of the top time management tips. Pay particular attention to where your documents are stored. That way you won’t waste precious time looking for them. Note down all of your assignments in a work journal or a digital document. Otherwise, you risk forgetting about them. You also shouldn’t eat where you work. This reduces concentration and makes you sleepy.

Be punctual

Try to arrive at work and leave on time. Taking too many days off without a strong reason or without notifying your superiors is a bad idea. If you want to leave work early, inform your manager about it.

Don’t make colleagues wait for your part of the job to be done. Especially if you work on a large project and people rely on you. Your inaction or lazy work will affect their progress as well.

It seems that many of us are capable of distributing our time and the time of our employees properly and in a rational way. If that’s the case, why are we so often confronted with the lack of this prominent, valuable and sadly finite resource? At first, it seems that we do everything right: write down plans in our notebooks, minimise distractions and stick to following our goals. Perhaps the root cause of our losses and time deficit lies in failing to follow effective time management rules? Let’s try to find out what can cause this and learn how to properly manage our time in an effective and rational manner.

In order to do this, we have to talk about the four-frame model of time management. If we want to understand its principles, we must first define what time management actually means. Effective time management is a science, a tool or a teaching about properly managing, distributing, organising, recording and using time.

Why do we need the time management process?

• It is a tool that allows completing the most set tasks in the shortest time possible;

• The time management process helps set our work priorities straight;

• It gives an opportunity to focus on the most vital tasks first and tackle less important responsibilities only after dealing with high priority level assignments;

• By following proper time management models, you will have time for leisure, family and a vibrant life outside of work.

Of course, you shouldn’t forget that effective time management is going to lead you to master new important skills and methods that are used in achieving specific goals and completing important projects. The time management process is a huge mechanism that contains a wide variety of actions, skills, and abilities as any other discipline. These include proper goal planning, delegating responsibility, making lists and plans, monitoring, analysing time costs, evaluating the value of various actions, setting priorities, etc.

What is a four-frame model exactly?

Classic time management emerged some time ago, back when there was a solitary approach towards management. The world is constantly developing, and the same can be said about the study of effective time distribution. After the 2012 release of the book “Reframing Organisations: Artistry, Choice and Leadership” by Lee Bolman and Terry Deal, the time management process became viewed as a complex, multi-layered apparatus. That’s when the “four-frame model” notion first appeared. It is a system of controlling your time as well as the system, process, yourself, and other people.

The main difference between monostatic and four-frame management is that traditional time management is more oriented towards controlling time based on a single component — its priority. More specifically, it concerned doing your work tasks depending on the level of their importance. The four-frame model is a more detailed, accurate and multi-faceted tool that uncovers patterns and different time management models.

In simpler terms, in order to make your and your employee’s work effective and successful, you have to forget about viewing the time management process as a one-sided issue. When doing your job, you have to pay attention to all four factors mentioned below. Each of them will help you reach goals and keep up with the deadlines.

• You have to learn how to use every minute of your time properly and control it completely;

• A good company director has to develop a system for carrying out certain tasks, whether this concerns his own duties or work executed by his employees;

• You have to be in complete control of how employees work on certain tasks and projects. We don’t suggest that you should constantly control every work process aspect. Not to mention that a company CEO has to inspect and supervise some of the most valuable or problematic work areas;

• The final and not in the least bit important four-frame time management factor: a good boss has to have self-discipline as well as the ability to control his subordinates, be self-collected, make rational and consecutive decisions.

Of course, one shouldn’t forget about self-discipline as it is important for employees of any position: from the highest to the lowest levels. When both you and your employee are orderly and polite, planning effective time management will be a breeze. In case you don’t have a proper level of self-organisation and aren’t that good at setting your priorities straight, you will find it hard to systematise and structure your own time.

By using this model out of all time management models, you will start controlling your own time, your employee’s time and the work process as a whole. It seems as if this tool was specially tailored for your own perception of time, your attitude towards life and work. It will take into account the peculiarities of your system, as well as your work process into consideration and will be oriented towards the people who surround you.

Being an estate agent is a role that encompasses multiple functions, vast data, and ongoing communication with property sellers, buyers, and developers. However, most of these functions can now be assigned to bespoke software for estate management. Surprised? Let’s delve into how estate software for property management and scheduling assists businesses to maintain top-tier services and consequently, ensures high customer satisfaction.

If you wish to succeed in the competitive real estate sector, it’s crucial to stay ahead of other agents. This implies not confining yourself to a single location and securing as many property listings as possible. A property viewing scheduler will be invaluable for streamlining your business and team.

Real estate scheduling apps extend beyond just organising routines. They provide assistance with numerous tasks you may encounter:

• managing your busy schedules;
• securing more listing appointments;
• planning cleaners’ visits and decorators’ work before viewings;
• calculating payroll for your staff if you own an estate agency;
• facilitating simple and effective communication within your team.

By organising your schedule well, you can maximise the number of appointments and viewings, which will directly affect your commission earnings.

The Features of the Best Property Management Software in 2024

Let’s examine how software for estate management can simplify your daily routines, and which features are particularly beneficial for estate agents:

Job scheduling option

When you have a team working for you, you need to organise their work schedules, distribute workloads, and monitor assignments to ensure smooth operation of the agency, attracting clientele and generating profit. Creating optimal schedules for your employees based on their submitted availability and job qualifications is a key feature of modern estate scheduling software. In Shifton, for example, you can include all relevant information, such as location and tasks, and share assignments with your employees online, so they have everything needed to perform optimally on their mobile devices. Each person completes their portion of work, and you avoid issues and redundancies thanks to a well-conceived estate scheduler.

Digital tasks, forms, and checklists for seamless operations

Having a shared platform for collaborative work with your team allows you to streamline the entire workflow. In addition, this feature serves both your team’s tasks and your personal task management plans.

• You rapidly create tasks and assign them to your employees,
• You maintain a clear view of their progress in real-time directly within the estate scheduling software. This could involve anything from ad-hoc maintenance requests to routine inspections and cleaning duties.
• You can provide all necessary information for your employees to commence work and complete tasks on time, including notes and deadlines.
• In a real estate scheduler like Shifton, you can create bespoke reports, forms, and checklists for your staff to fill in, use electronic signatures to verify each employee’s identity, and submit them back for your review to remain informed and ensure compliance.

Manage your facilities with ease

Whether you’re operating an estate agency, working as an independent estate agent, conducting property inspections, or managing facilities, you need complete oversight of all your resources at a glance. That’s where property management software comes into play. It enables you to list all facilities and properties, manage them, and allocate tasks related to these properties to your staff. The primary benefits of these solutions include:

• Flexibility in managing each facility or estate item and documenting all relevant information through estate management software.
• Assigning properties for sale to your team to distribute responsibilities.

Ensure the safety and performance of your field staff

Estate shift scheduling software equips brokers, agents, inspectors, and field staff with essential tools for excellent work, including digital safety forms and secure site check-in and check-out. Moreover, when your staff is on-site, they need not spend time post-task completion compiling reports. In the premier app for realtors, such as Shifton, checklists and reports can be completed remotely, via mobile, even while on the move, thus simplifying the work process.

Enhance customer experience

Shifton exemplifies a leading planner for estate agents, offering all the capabilities necessary to elevate the customer experience thanks to advanced functionality, including these built-in tools:

• Automated appointment confirmations and reminders to avert missed appointments.
• Rapid replacement scheduling when an agent can’t complete an appointment – with the ability to assign another employee to maintain operations and enhance customer loyalty.
• Location pairing to swiftly match frontline workers with customers, saving time and reducing costs for longer appointments.
• Comment fields for sharing information from past tasks and providing instant feedback while staff are on-site.
• Virtual meeting options to expand team-building efforts and enable instant communication within a unified online workspace.
• Intelligent job matching and automated staff scheduling based on business priorities to consistently adhere to SLAs. For example, enabling property valuation companies to allocate available workers promptly to new tasks to meet strict deadlines for large clients.

By transferring numerous operations to the online realm using estate scheduling software, you reap several benefits, including streamlining processes for speedier deal completion and improved customer service.

What Are the Benefits of Property Management Software for Real Estate Businesses?

The primary advantages of utilising specific software for estate management lie in its practical nature and the meticulously designed tools incorporated within.

• It enhances efficiency by automating complex and recurring daily tasks and processes, permitting you to save time and focus on overarching goals.
• It allows you to organise, manage, and monitor crucial information and processes on a centralised platform, which you can instantly share with your staff via cloud technologies.
• It improves business security by offering a secure platform to handle sensitive details, such as tenant information, personal data of sellers, buyers, landlords, and their financials. With advanced protection measures, the estate scheduling app and its cloud storage safeguard against data breaches.
• It offers real-time insights by providing a comprehensive view of all data across the system and delivering instant feedback from workers. This enables you to remain at the forefront of your operations and make informed, timely, and astute decisions.

The days when operating a successful real estate business relied on a paper planner and a calculator are long past. To outpace competitors and secure more clients and lucrative deals today, you need to be quick, client-focused, provide flexible and informed decisions, and cultivate teamwork synergy. All of this can be achieved with high-tech solutions. In 2024, an estate scheduler is essential for agents and agency owners. Moreover, if this scheduler is as advanced as Shifton, you gain even further benefits, nurturing an ecosystem that enhances staff communication.

The niche of retail is highly profitable and in demand, yet it has numerous hidden pitfalls that can lead to low efficiency in retail management. There is no need to fear them as retail management tips by Shifton may help you handle the challenges on your way to the highest-efficiency retail management workflow.

The first thing to consider for an effective manager in retail is that this business requires you to manage a diverse range of items and processes daily. Consider it an incessant flow of water you need to manage. This flow includes overseeing all store employees, delegating various tasks to them, managing their completion, whilst being part of a team to provide synergy. Sounds a bit fantastic? It’s real when you have informational support and know how to synergise your retail team’s work. Shifton shares the most effective retail staff management tips to assist you.

What is a retail manager and what tasks do they perform?

A retail manager is someone who manages a retail store, assists with management, or manages a certain department. Since retail stores can vary in size from small businesses with a few hundred feet of storefronts to large warehouses, malls, and supermarkets owned by huge corporations, the duties and tasks of a retail manager can vary. Moreover, they can also vary from day to day depending on the current load on a selling point or a department, customer flow, and even seasonality.

Yet, most commonly, being a retail manager includes the following retail staff management tasks:

• arranging the store environment to make it ergonomic and attractive for customers;
• managing store employees, their tasks, and results;
• maintaining and tracking inventory available;
• tracking, mitigating, and preventing shoplifting losses;
• customer service which relies on your assistance;
• tracking sales over set periods and providing reports to higher executives.

In brief, a retail manager is an employee responsible for the overall functionality and effectiveness of a selling point.

How to be a good retail manager

We offer you a couple of tips that suit retail managers of any type and size of business and provide effective retail staff management when applied.

Retail scheduling is a must!

Your selling point should work like clockwork to bring profit. For this, you need your personnel to start their work on time and work simultaneously. Thus, even for a small grocery store, you need to provide proper retail scheduling. And regular and logical shifts in supermarkets or malls are essential.

Although scheduling in the retail industry can be a nightmare, the solution is simple and embodied in modern retail scheduling software. With it, you do not need to keep huge amounts of data in mind or write them in tables on paper to decide on time-off requests, holidays, emergencies, busy times, slack times, or sick times, etc. Instead, you use an automated tool and can fill in new variables and data on the go.

Using a proper retail scheduler, you can perform multiple tasks simultaneously.

• Deciding on the best combination of employees for each shift to make their work the most efficient and customer-friendly. You can select teams for the shift based on their skills, hard work, and the synergy they have.
• A retail scheduler like Shifton streamlines the scheduling process by providing alerts and suggestions so you can avoid double-bookings, conflicts, and scheduling someone when they can’t work. You optimise shift work schedules in a couple of moves, and you create optimal shift schedules instantly.
• Distribution of schedules and shifts is also up to retail employee scheduling software. Your team has access to the dashboard in the app and they can easily get info about when is their shift or propose changes if they encounter some obstacles. You can organise everything in the cloud so that it’s available anywhere, anytime, and alerts your retail team instantly of any changes provided. Each employee can propose changes to the schedule, independently swap shifts, receive alerts of work schedule changes

The best aspect of employee scheduling software for retail is that it automates everything that can be automated from shift assignments to salary calculations and working hours calculations for each employee and the team as a whole. You can automatically create an optimal rotation schedule for shop assistants, cashiers, guards, loaders, and sales floor staff with automatic coordination of shift changes and assignment of shifts to employees including overtime.

Retail manager tasks

Task management is also part of retail staff management routines. You need to highlight daily tasks, decide on their executors, track their completion, and report on the results. The good news is that you can use the same retail scheduler as retail task management software. It includes tasks you need to delegate to the employees you manage, and besides, you can plan your days and provide checklists for yourself so as not to miss anything. You can set priorities, control the completion of each assignment, and provide notifications about crucially important tasks and timelines for both you and your staff.

Use effective time management

When we said that retail points should work like clockwork, it was about effective time management too. If your shop assistants are constantly late, couriers do not manage timely delivery, or your warehouse staff forgets about supplying stocks, what happens then? A true disaster! However, it can also be automated to mitigate the risks that we listed. You need to apply time and attendance management software for retail. Shifton offers this opportunity in its scheduling software for large retail businesses. The same applies during periods of downtime where there are fewer customers, and most employees are not engaged in workflow. Good time management is what allows you to provide flexible solutions for your team: when you need them to start working, when you need to have more staff in the store to cope with intense customer flow, and when you can provide them with days off without sacrificing store’s efficiency. Just try to provide time management in Shifton, and you may be surprised by how easy it is when automated and streamlined.

Hire a high-quality team

Your store’s or department’s effectiveness starts with your team. You can have some assistant managers, if you manage a large department to delegate recruiting and headhunting tasks, and you can use retail scheduling software to control the efficiency of each worker to replace them if they are not meeting your requirements or appear to be underperforming.

Use retail scheduling software

As you can see, multiple retail management routines can be eased by retail employee scheduling software. With this software, you achieve higher results in the following areas:

• managing employees’ scheduling;
• analysing daily sales;
• tracking employee time off;
• providing effective task management for you and each employee.

From a wider perspective, it can help you build an effective management strategy and set goals for each selling point that are achievable and logical.

Focus on your store’s traffic

Traffic in a selling point is what indicates its profitability. You can use software to count customers and export reports about busy times. By knowing your store’s traffic and when you’re the busiest, you can be more prepared and prevent emergencies at peak dates, i.e., on holidays, Black Fridays, or sales times. It can help you schedule adequate staff for your expected number of customers and avoid arranging large organisational tasks or restocking for times when the store will be full of customers.

Provide instant data tracking

Retail management is based on numbers: sales, visitors, goods in stock, sold goods, income, and maintenance expenses, form the whole workflow. All this data requires your attention and accurate calculation. Manually, it’s a daunting task, but it still needs to be done. When you use retail scheduling software, you can keep all data in one place, operate it, and provide reports that show your management results in numbers.

What data to check and process?

• Customer numbers;
• Sales levels;
• Number of sold goods in specified periods;
• Working hours for each employee;
• Overworking;
• Peak hours in your store.

Then you can operate this data to analyse the whole work and enhance it when needed.

How to improve the management of a retail team?

Efficient team management in the retail industry can make all the difference in customer satisfaction and overall business success. Here are some additional tips:

• Provide the best scheduling template (like 2/2, 3/3, 1/3, 5/2), depending on your store’s specifics. Do not hesitate to try some of them to decide on the best one.
• Set clear tasks and notify your staff about them. You can create task assignments for employees in a cloud environment using the retail scheduler. Besides, do not forget to track these tasks, and provide checklists and task statuses for them. Shifton employee scheduling software provides you with all these functions.
• Send automatic push notifications and reminders to your staff to alert them and prevent missing shifts or outdated assignments.
• Do not remain stuck in your office place. Exchange shifts, weekends, and sick days online to save time and remain mobile.
• Motivate your employees with overtime bonuses – you can easily calculate them in employee scheduling software.
• Work with breaks to avoid simultaneous breaks in your team. Create pre-scheduled breaks or set limits on the number and duration of breaks to ensure that the in-store environment will always have enough staff to provide customer service.
• Work with attendance to understand when a person actually starts and ends their shift. If you detect some of your personnel are consistently late, you can impose penalties for poor performance in the same way you calculate bonuses.

Simplify Scheduling

With a robust employee communication app, you can schedule employees more efficiently in the following ways:

• Assign staff shifts based on job role and availability.
• Use drag and drop, assign shifts in bulk, set recurring shifts, create customisable templates, and even allow employees to claim open shifts available.
• Automated push notifications so employees can immediately accept or reject shifts directly from their mobile devices.
• Include shift tasks, notes, and even files within the schedule so employees know exactly what to do upon arriving at work.
• Complete oversight of collaborative staff scheduling in real-time whilst on the go.

Being an effective retail manager is not a mission impossible, whether managing a small store or a full-fledged retail department. Just remember that your efficiency is based on three pillars, which are as follows:

• Thorough planning and time management.
• Effective recruiting to build the best team.
• Flawless employee scheduling software helps with most routine tasks daily.

If the first two are mostly your responsibility, Shifton can provide you with the third pillar to make your management workflow simpler, time-saving, and effective.

Have you ever come across a product such as a restaurant scheduling app? If not, perhaps it’s time to consider which processes, tasks, and routines can be executed with the aid of specialised software for personnel management in restaurants. Gain insights from Shifton’s developers to apply the best features of such products in your workflow.

Being a restaurant manager is an endless race. You have to handle multiple tasks simultaneously, overseeing numerous staff, from a chef and sous-chefs to couriers, suppliers, cleaners, etc. Additionally, numerous emergencies can disrupt your process, and it’s entirely your responsibility, although standard tasks cannot be postponed either. All of this, on top of the everyday tasks from scheduling to payroll to reporting, can catch up with you.

However, you are not alone in this never-ending routine, as Shifton assists restaurant managers by simplifying their lives with the help of a single tool that can be a master key for you.

You probably won’t be surprised by the automation in the restaurant business. Nonetheless, a specialised app for restaurant management can help you spend more time doing what you love and conserve your nerve cells.

Restaurant management tips for staff happiness benefits

Whether you’re using sales forecasts and labour targets to create restaurant employee schedules or managing payroll processes, Shifton provides you with the necessary tools every step of the way. With the help of Shifton’s scheduling app for restaurants, you can automate and execute the following processes efficiently:

• Accurately track working hours for each employee;
• Reduce time theft and buddy punching in your restaurant;
• Empower your team members to provide your customers with the best service possible.

The best way to achieve a happy team is to communicate with them. In a single restaurant, this is already complex as everyone is constantly on the move. What about when it comes to chain establishments, then? With Shifton’s restaurant management application, you provide your staff with a communication channel to connect with one another and with you as well. You can observe in real time how communication in a shared environment helps to reduce misunderstandings and, consequently, numerous drawbacks, and how it increases your staff’s loyalty and makes them happier while their workload remains the same.

Enhance your staff’s performance with shift schedule tips

For a restaurant, having a clear and well-thought-out schedule is essential. You need your chefs and their assistants to be at work at a scheduled time. Suppose you do not schedule your cleaners to start preparing the restaurant’s hall to greet visitors in its full splendour. You need waiters to be fully ready to start serving customers in a timely manner. Your reputation is at risk if any part of this operation fails due to scheduling errors.

Utilising an automated restaurant staff scheduler is like a magic key. It helps enhance employees’ productivity and boost your revenue. Let’s consider how to decide on the type of schedule for your establishment and which tips to utilise to make it work seamlessly.

Scheduling software for restaurants

With the help of personnel management software, you can create a basic set of scheduling policies and adhere to them. This forms the foundation for the entire operation, and it helps you to manage how far in advance you will publish schedules and how far in advance employees need to request time off. You can also include setting minimum hours for each employee or designating particular shifts as high-traffic (and therefore more lucrative for tips) using a scheduling app for restaurants.

As a result:

• You provide your team with a clear vision of their future work and the number of shifts/working hours they have to work.
• You demonstrate proficiency in time management and, therefore, reinforce your professionalism in your employees’ eyes.
• You motivate your staff to select high-traffic shifts to earn more tips.

Employee engagement

Now, we move to the next step. You need to maintain the highest engagement of your team to ensure your restaurant’s flawless operation. With an automated system for restaurant management, you can give your team real-time feedback on their performance, provide timely advice and receive their feedback. Software for restaurant management like Shifton provides managers and employees with a convenient communication channel and helps your team feel supported and engaged at work.

Employee retention

In the restaurant business, employee turnover seems natural, but it is a significant challenge at the same time, as finding and hiring true professionals who won’t let you down is difficult. Efficiently managing your restaurant is about showing your employees that you respect their time and value their talent, thus making them engaged and loyal to their job. An effective restaurant management system is a key component of building a positive environment. Therefore, do not overlook the staff you have but simultaneously, evaluate their efficiency to decide on strengthening the team with new employees or encouraging your current personnel to work better. With Shifton’s software for restaurant management, you can evaluate the efficiency of each worker using multiple parameters including working hours, overtime, customer satisfaction levels, etc.

Rapid notifications and reminders

Do you want your staff to execute their duties perfectly? Is it crucial for them to handle the multiple tasks you set? Do not risk anything being missed or forgotten. Automated shift reminders integrated into scheduling software for restaurants can significantly reduce no-shows or missed tasks. Simply develop notifying text messages or push notifications and adjust the settings to send them to employees’ mobile devices at a specific time. The same applies to alerting messages in case of emergencies, notifications about corporate events, or future team-building meetings if you organise them.

Gather data and utilise it wisely

At the end of each day, take notes on how your staff handled the daily routines, which shortcomings were critical, and which work warranted reward. You can also analyse the efficiency of each shift to ascertain if you’re consistently understaffed or overstaffed during a specific shift. All that data is easily tracked in Shifton’s restaurant management system. Simply use this data to adjust your schedule accordingly, develop your management strategy, and report the results to a restaurant owner.

Boost productivity with advanced solutions embodied in the Shifton restaurant scheduling app

Restaurant management tools benefit your entire team, from hosts and waiters to chefs. When you maintain higher efficiency of operations and streamlined communication using software solutions, this results in a less stressful work environment for everyone.

What kinds of technologies support the restaurant business? Let’s explore this.

Employee scheduling software

With automation, you can forget about tedious work with spreadsheets, tables, paper schedules, and plans.

Instead, restaurant employee scheduling software based on cloud technologies provides you and your staff with the following features:

• Rapid schedule development in just a few clicks, available in Shifton in the form of convenient templates.
• Efficient distribution of information about schedules and shifts among your employees.
• Flexible adjustments and changes to the schedule, which you can implement online from anywhere in the world.
• Simple tracking of working hours, overtime, missed shifts, or days off.

Task management software

Setting tasks using dedicated staff management software? That is truly the best way to keep your restaurant running smoothly. In Shifton, you can create checklists for every worker from chef to server and monitor their completion. From cleaning flat tops to refilling sanitisers, it’s easy for tasks to get lost in the shuffle.

That’s where task management software comes in.

• It’s an excellent way to streamline your tasks, with separate checklists for each role and shift.
• It allows you to track your team’s productivity.
• It helps minimise shortcomings and track missed or forgotten tasks. Task management software maintains a historical record of tasks completed, enabling you to review it and obtain the information you need.

Employee communications tools

When it comes to employee communications, texting and phone calls are the most popular methods. However, they are not ideal for restaurants where each worker is constantly on the move and has limited time to check SMSs or answer calls. The best idea is to provide your employees with a shared environment to communicate with you and each other. Within a restaurant management system, it is beneficial for the following reasons:

• You can contact each employee with ease.
• They can communicate with one another to avoid misunderstandings and buddy punching.
• You can monitor the entire working process by checking the information your employees share with each other. If something goes wrong, you are among the first to know about it.

Shifton provides a secure, business-centric communication tool that allows you to share schedules and announcements instantly. It also simplifies employees’ requests for time off and addresses payroll concerns such as missing punches.

Timekeeping in restaurants

Timekeeping restaurant software is an essential tool. With time-clocking software, employees clock in and out with the touch of a button. Plus, the software syncs directly with your payroll to automatically calculate hours worked.

Restaurant time clocking software can also help prevent early clock-ins, thereby reducing labour costs. It addresses issues with enforced break times and shift durations. The software quickly calculates overtime and maintains secure records of your team’s hours.

Payroll automation

Utilising restaurant employee management software is a fantastic alternative to hiring a payroll specialist or giving your accounts department an additional workload to calculate salaries. Instead, all working hours are tracked and payroll is calculated instantly in Shifton. This automates wage calculations, overtime pay, and tax and benefit withholdings. There’s no reliance on manual calculations, so you’ll have fewer payroll errors and spend less time at the computer.

As every type of software mentioned is useful, having all of them in one tool is a blessing. That’s what Shifton offers to restaurant managers. Payroll software syncs directly with your time clock and scheduling software in Shifton, and you are provided with a unified environment for most management tasks and operations.

What are the benefits of restaurant management software?

The most significant benefits of Shifton for restaurant management goals are as follows:

• A shared environment for managers and employees to communicate and provide instant feedback.
• An all-in-one tool that combines the features of time management software, task management tools, HR tools, shift scheduler, and a communication channel.
• It offers adjustable multi-level access to its functions, suitable for managers and staff at different levels.
• It automates most processes you previously had to remember or handle manually.

Hence, using restaurant management software, you enhance the entire restaurant business operation, eliminate possibilities of mistakes and drawbacks, and manage your team more easily. The results are beneficial for you as a manager, as you work efficiently and without hassle, and for your team, as its members can satisfy their customers and receive reasonable rewards for their efforts.