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

Today, we’re exploring the art of crafting a work schedule that fits each employee’s unique needs and life circumstances. When we talk about top-notch schedule planning, we also talk about slick automated scheduling, killer reporting tools, seamless payroll integration, flexibility, and the ability to tweak things around the clock. Sound 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 schedule employee shifts and progress, making their jobs more manageable. Back then, managers had to manually do all the scheduling, which was wasting time. They had to deal with messy 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 simple and avoid disputes.

How to Create a Schedule for Employees Easily?

Managers can create schedules online with automated tools easily. Here’s a laid-back guide to creating a scheduling spreadsheet:

1. Fire up your spreadsheet programme and start a fresh sheet.
2. Toss in some column headings to keep things organised.
3. Stick “Employee Name” in column A.
4. If you’re into employee IDs, pop those in column B.
5. Label the following columns with the days of the week, starting with Monday or whatever works for your week.
6. Drop in your employee names and IDs under the correct headings.
7. Fill in the blanks with shift times, using “am” and “pm” for clarity, or go full military time if you’re into that.

Once you’ve sorted it out, share the schedule with your team however works best — whether it’s up on the noticeboard, through email, or on your internal chat. Ensure everyone can see freshly made schedules to know when to clock in. Easy, right?

Meet Shifton Daily Planner Online

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

Here’s what you get:

• A weekly schedule planner that keeps things above board.
• Instant updates to keep everyone in the loop.
• 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 a piece of cake. It has cool automation features that speed things up, and you can save and reuse templates quickly. The result? A neat table that’s a breeze 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’s why a daily planner is a game-changer:

• Easy Templates: There’s no need to start creating schedules from scratch every time. With a daily planner, you’ve got a bunch 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 a heads-up 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 whip up 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 vital parts of running any business. This handy online tool is like having an extra pair of hands, making daily tasks smoother and keeping the restaurant running like clockwork. But let’s go more specific!

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 a game-changer:

• It cooks up optimal staff rotation schedules in a snap, especially 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 ship in the restaurant biz.

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 whips up 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 crew. It’s not just about nailing 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 newest modules ‘Activities’ and ‘Demand & Forecasting’ it became clear, Shifton grew up to be something more than just a simple shift planning solution. In fact, we have too many modules, and we want to simplify their understanding. We decided to merge some modules, providing more value in one go, effectively changing pricing for some modules, to reflect their increased value.

The Base module will now include 3 additional reports: ‘Budget reports’, ‘Company employees’ and ‘Minimum weekly work time report’. The base price module will change to $1 to reflect these additions and the heaps of other features we added as base functionality over the years.

‘Time off requests’ will get fantastic insights, previously part of ‘Vacation Management’ and the price will be $1. Now it includes ‘Time Off Reports’ at no additional cost.

‘Attendance’ module price changing to $1 and the following modules price aligned to $0.5: ‘Employee working hours’, ‘Bonuses/Retentions’ & ‘Pay rate reports’. The latter is also renamed to ‘Payroll’ to reflect recent additions to its functionality and our future plans to add even more.

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

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

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

Most workers have a standard Monday to Friday work week with typical hours from 9-10 AM to 6-7 PM. However, this scheduling doesn’t suit organisations and companies that need to operate 24/7, such as hospitals, call centres, and fire departments, to name a few.

For example, many fire departments use a 48/96 hour work schedule. This means that firefighters typically work two days straight and then get four days off. Although they need to stay alert for two days with limited sleep or rest, recent studies show this type of shift work gives them enough time for leisure, sleep, and preparing for the next rotation.

Hospitals must always have nurses available to provide 24/7 patient care. They may work 8/12-hour shifts on schedules like 3 workdays/3 days off or 2 workdays/2 days off. Generally, nurses work fixed shifts (day or night). For example, day-time nurses start at 7 AM and finish at 7 PM, while night-time caregivers start at 7 PM, work late-night hours, and finish at 7 AM.

Call centres may have their own shift work rules, but there are several common methods for maintaining a steady 24/7 work cycle. Managers typically divide a day into 2 or 3 shifts. In one scenario, a day is divided into two 12-hour shifts for morning and evening workers. Another option includes three 8-hour shifts, such as: 6 AM – 2 PM (1st), 2 PM – 10 PM (2nd), and 10 PM — 6 AM (3rd).

In some cases, employees must alternate between shifts: working morning shifts for a few days and then switching to night shifts for the same duration. According to recent research, changing work hours negatively affects sleep and eating patterns. Working night shifts can lead to insomnia, high blood pressure, and appetite disorders. This article will outline ways to better adapt to a night-time schedule.

12-hour night shift sleep schedule example

The human body’s circadian rhythm dictates waking and resting schedules. People working in 24/7 cycle organisations, such as police officers, firefighters, nurses, call centre operators, and petrol station workers, experience disruptions to their circadian clocks. Typically, managers have to plan shift work so workers receive adequate time for both 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 may also agree to a 12 AM — 5 AM schedule if required. Despite losing five work hours a week compared to day-time colleagues, night-shift workers receive the same 40-hour-week salary. Night shift staff may be called in for extra hours, but do no more than 8 hours in 24 hours.

16-17-year-old staff are prohibited from working between 12 and 4 AM. However, they are allowed to work from 10 PM to 6 AM if employed by hotels, retail shops, or hospitals. No restrictions apply to night shift hours for hospitals, emergency services, TV, and radio stations.

Many workers transitioning from a morning to an evening shift experience exhaustion, insomnia, and changes in weight and appetite. It takes time to adjust to new waking and sleeping hours, but there are tricks to make the process less challenging for newcomers.

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

For a smooth transition between shifts, the body must be prepared for upcoming changes. If an employee rotates between morning and evening shifts, the wake-up and bedtime should be adjusted accordingly. Switching from morning to night shifts requires waking up and going to bed an hour later for a few days. To transition from night to morning working hours, employees should wake up and go to bed an hour earlier for a few days.

Regardless of when work begins, a good night’s sleep is essential for a productive day on the job. In general, workers should sleep at least 6 hours a day to feel rested. However, those working night shifts struggle with this due to our bodies being naturally active in the daytime. The solution is to adapt the environment to mimic nighttime conditions.

First and foremost, all noise should be blocked out. Turning off your smartphone, doorbell, and TV is a must. If you’re used to sleeping with white noise, investing in good noise-cancelling headphones under 200 dollars can eliminate sounds that disturb your sleep. It also helps if the bedroom is the quietest part of your home. Soundproof windows with good insulation can further reduce outdoor noise. Informing friends and neighbours about your sleep schedule helps avoid untimely calls.

It’s also important to darken the room as much as possible, even when the sun is bright outside. Blackout curtains are an effective solution. Avoid eating or drinking right before bedtime. Don’t consume alcohol or caffeine hours before sleep. A good book or a hot shower/bath can help your body relax and fall asleep easier.

How shift work changes appetite

Changes in circadian rhythm affect both sleep and eating patterns. Irregular or excessive eating, especially at night, leaves workers feeling tired and restless, impacting their productivity and health.

Here are several tips for surviving the night shift while minimising the risk of gastrointestinal diseases or weight gain. Before work, it’s important to have the biggest meal of the day to be energised and ready for work. 6 PM is the optimal time for this meal if working late into the night.

What to eat during night shift work

Drowsiness and fatigue are common side effects of working night shifts. These can be alleviated by maintaining a healthy diet. During night shifts, workers should focus on high-protein foods like tuna, chicken, tofu, eggs, and low-fat cheese. These will help maintain alertness and focus.

These can be made into nutritious snacks employees can take to work. For example, pack a brown rice salad with chicken breast and tofu or a vegetable and bean soup. Keep hunger at bay with hazelnuts, apples, Greek yoghurt, almonds, carrots, and hummus – all good and healthy choices.

It’s also important to drink enough water during night shifts. Staying hydrated reduces reliance on coffee or sweets for alertness and energy. Sugar-free black and herbal tea, fresh vegetable juices, and cold water are great hydration choices.

What to avoid during night shift work

Consuming high-carbohydrate foods shortly before or during a night shift leads to drowsiness and low productivity. Foods like potatoes, bread, or cereals cause sedation and relaxation, making it difficult for workers to power through a night shift.

Sugary beverages and foods can be equally harmful. While soda or a candy bar may initially seem like good energy sources, they cause drowsiness a few hours later. Additionally, the human body struggles to process sugar effectively during nighttime.

Excess caffeine is another risk for night shift workers. A few cups at the start of a night shift are fine, but consuming it throughout can cause insomnia and other sleep disorders. The daily intake shouldn’t exceed 400 mg of caffeine (about four small cups).

We hope the advice provided is helpful for night shift workers.

Technologies are designed to make our lives easier, and when it comes to business operation, WFM software truly aligns with this idea. Are you aware of what this exceptional type of software product is? Perhaps you’re thinking about launching WFM scheduling software to ensure seamless operations of your staff and business overall, but you’re still unsure how to proceed. In that case, our article could be beneficial 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 use 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 enhance your staff’s operation and ensure that your human resources are used efficiently 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 leaves, etc.
• Regulatory compliance – that’s what typical WFM software helps to regulate and implement in the company’s regimen.

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 mainly on the software developers’ ideas, 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 right number of agents are available for each shift.
• Call Routing Optimisation – Assigning the most suitable agents to specific customer interactions.
• Performance Monitoring – Tracking agent activity to spot areas for improvement.
• Schedule Compliance – Making sure there’s adherence to assigned shifts and break times.

By leveraging call centre workforce management systems, businesses can streamline operations and enhance 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 right 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 enhance call quality and response accuracy.
• Prevents overworking employees by balancing workloads effectively.

Better Customer Experience

• Enhances call routing by allocating the right agent to the right task.
• Reduces customer wait times, boosting 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 improve 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 right 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 that 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 well-being 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 jobs 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 inquiries 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.

Thank you for clarifying! Making amendments to the last section, removing mentions of AI and productivity.

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 almost everything, including the security service sector where beyond using specialised security surveillance tools, you can also utilise security guard scheduling software to boost your company’s efficiency, lifting it to the highest levels.

At Shifton, we have numerous successful examples of implementing security guard management software, and we’re pleased to share some insider tips and highlight the advantages of such a technical solution with our blog readers.

What is Security Guard Scheduling Software?

The main idea of security scheduling software is to optimise your human resources to make them operate at maximum efficiency. In the context of a security department or a company providing security and bodyguarding services, this product addresses the following issues:

• Proper scheduling to ensure fair and transparent shifts for everyone in your company. You can create rosters and share them with your team immediately in a single environment to inform them, or even allow them to choose when to work and which shifts to take on.
• Avoiding overworking. This tool assists management in preventing excessive workload on some workers while others might remain inactive and earn less.
• Supervise your staff’s time. Specifically, at Shifton, we utilise GPS within our security staff scheduling software, enabling business owners or managers in charge to monitor each employee’s clock-ins and clock-outs, their absence at the workplace, or lateness issues.
• Accurate accounting processes. In the security service business, you’ll have numerous features to consider when calculating payroll. By using an adapted security guard schedule template, you can automatically compute salaries, add bonuses or penalties for each employee, and conveniently send ready-prepared tables with payroll calculations to your accounts department.

How Does Security Guard Scheduling Software Work?

Naturally, each security scheduling software might have its unique features in terms of functionality, but generally, it operates similarly.

• You have an environment accessible to your employees where you create schedules using pre-designed templates or by developing your own template.
• You can easily complete the form and allocate work shifts and hours amongst your employees.
• When it’s time to compute payroll, the platform automatically logs work hours for each employee and generates a table or a report that you can utilise for payroll purposes.
• Should your software also function as security guard tracking software, it provides specialised tools to record work hours and enable your staff to indicate when they start and finish their shifts.

That’s a brief rundown of any security guard scheduling software. However, if you desire it to be the most effective and offer advanced functionality, you can gain all that benefits from Shifton.

Shifton Best Security Guard Scheduling Software of 2024

Why do we assert that Shifton is the best security guard management software? There are numerous reasons for this. Generally, the key features that position our product at the top of the market for security service agencies and security departments are as follows:

• Built-in scenarios and templates for successful workflow scheduling in the agency. We supply clients with numerous templates suited to varied business and hiring models, allowing you to tailor them to your specific workflow.
• Special task module, providing extensive options to assign tasks alongside creating schedules and shifts. This multifactor assignment module assists in keeping track of who is responsible for what, when they need to take up shifts, and simultaneously assigning tasks to be completed during the shift.
• Effortless and adaptable shift changes. In case of an emergency or an unforeseen situation, you can adjust shifts, provide replacements, and still receive immediate information about each worker’s total work hours to prevent overworking.
• Real-time communication with your team. Shifton provides straightforward communication with the entire staff through the app’s built-in tools. You can promptly notify your workers about changes, obtain their feedback, and contact them via the app when they are in the field.
• Alert tools that facilitate instant delivery of your messages to staff with seamless verification of their receipt.
• Advanced payroll tools that offer comprehensive salary calculations, including special scenarios for bonus applications and penalties.
• Tracking tools to oversee task performance, shift taking, and on-time arrivals.

That’s the basic package we provide, and in addition to it, you can utilise this 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

Still, what makes security scheduling software so crucial for niche industries? Let’s examine the most significant benefits.

Optimised Coverage for Security Goals

Nothing is worse than understaffing in the security industry. Failing to provide enough guards to achieve the highest security standards costs more than just a client, it jeopardises your reputation. By utilising special security scheduling software, you can strategically plan your security coverage and engage as many personnel as required for an outstanding performance.

Improved Visibility and Accountability

Shifton, as a prime example of security management software, offers superior visibility and accountability. You no longer need to draft plans and verify them in the office. Instantly, you can view schedules and current tasks for each employee, recognising who is on duty and who is off. You don’t need to spend time on calls to clarify the current situation. Simply launch the app to instantly access all personnel-related information.

Lower Scheduling Overhead

Save precious time on scheduling and tracking various details. This can be done automatically by your security scheduling software. Even the most complex rules and calculations are performed flawlessly with the aid of software.

Real-Time Monitoring

Real-time workflow tracking is invaluable. Thus, you can promptly respond to new situations, pre-plan future activities, and obtain instant updates on emergencies, delays, or any unexpected scenarios. Hence, you can address them promptly to sustain smooth operations.

Improved Communication

Effective communication between team members and managers is central to any business. That’s why employing security guard management software aids in maintaining communication in the swiftest and most efficient manner. You can receive immediate feedback from your guards regarding task completion, learn about necessary schedule changes from employees unable to take a shift, or notify your team about anything with assured communication to everyone.

These features, implemented within Shifton’s cutting-edge technical framework, assist businesses engaged in security services to achieve their goals and offer clients flawless service levels. Additionally, such software reduces costs and saves time for CEOs, allowing them to concentrate on more vital matters instead of constantly overseeing and scheduling their teams.

Being a hotelier or a CEO in the hospitality sector comes with a range of duties, challenges, and emergencies, which can be managed using employee management software for hotels. It’s not a secret that a substantial portion of processes in any hotel connects to communication with your staff. Hotels typically have numerous employees. Even if it’s a family-run establishment, you can’t manage it solo.

This fact leads to another: many hiccups and mistakes you might face when trying to establish your hotel business result from a lack of timely and effective communication with your staff. At Shifton, we understand this thoroughly and can help you navigate such situations by sharing our expertise and hotel scheduling software.

How to manage hotel staff: keys for success

Your team should work smoothly because your hotel’s reputation and your clients’ loyalty heavily depend on their performance. This means you should consider all potential challenges that could undermine your efforts to create a flawless hotel. Particularly, these require your attention:

• Lack of communication among your employees and teams.
• Difficulties with shift scheduling, leading to issues with customer service.
• Low flexibility in managing staff, leading to shortages over time.
• Poorly developed task management.
• Lack of motivation and an ineffective system of rewards and penalties.

Beyond your efforts to alleviate these issues, employee management software for hotels can be useful in assessing and adjusting your staff operations. Save time, consider communication channels to reach your staff timely, but firstly, analyse the issues that frequently occur in your operation to address them.

Communication issues in the hospitality industry

The first and foremost thing to ensure is communication in the hotel industry. You need your managers to book rooms promptly for clients and inform maids about which rooms need cleaning. You require timely information about who is starting the shift today and who will come to the shift tomorrow. Your bartenders need to report what supplies they require for the bar, and the security service must provide timely reports. That’s just the tip of the iceberg, and communication is the foundation of success. What happens when it’s lacking?

• The entire operation could descend into chaos.
• Customers might be dissatisfied and leave negative reviews on your service.
• Staff shortages become inevitable.
• You lose money, and you lose good workers instead of motivating them more.

Sounds bad, doesn’t it? However, you need just one thing besides your time for maintaining hotels – staff scheduling software for hotels, which helps to tackle multiple issues simultaneously.

Automation of staff management and planning

When you acquire Shifton’s employee management software for hotels, you gain an all-purpose tool at your disposal.

1. Your staff won’t miss their shifts or overwork due to a GPS-enabled time clock that allows them to clock in and out directly from their mobile devices.
2. You can create schedules for all teams as simply as possible with integrated hotel employee schedule templates.
3. You receive instant information about your establishment’s operations via automated reporting in the software.
4. You streamline daily tasks and operations, making time management more effective.
5. Automated human resources tasks assist with more efficient and personalised hiring and onboarding processes.
6. You get a communication framework and information access for your staff with employees being able to access crucial info on the go, as Shifton functions as an employee mobile app for hotels.
7. Receiving feedback from your staff is crucial, and you get a digital social feed that encourages employee engagement and collaboration.
8. Seamless payroll and accounting integration with QuickBooks Online – this helps you calculate salaries fairly and promptly, automatically motivating good employees.

How to improve the management of a work team?

Efficient team management in the hospitality industry can significantly impact customer satisfaction and overall business success. With Shifton, you can use these tips and see positive outcomes almost immediately.

• Use special scheduling templates, like 2/2, 3/3, 1/3, 5/2, to create effective work shifts and logically distribute your staff.
• Utilise the Tasks tool to assign tasks to employees, track their completion, create checklists for maids and cooks, for instance, and check task statuses instantly to ensure everything’s okay. This simplifies operations and makes task management beneficial for your profit.
• Notify your staff using their mobile apps. By operating in a shared framework, your employees will receive automatic push notifications and reminders that are never missed.
• Provide greater flexibility by managing shift swaps, weekends, and sick days online. Your staff will appreciate speedy responses to their urgent needs for replacements or sick days, and your business will benefit from it too.
• Motivate your employees with overtime bonuses. They can be calculated automatically, as Shifton records each employee’s working hours and provides clear reports on who overworks today.
• Manage breaks so they don’t harm your business. Schedule breaks in advance or set limits on the number and duration of breaks.
• Monitor attendance and receive timely details on when individuals actually start and finish their shifts, and who was late or missed a shift.

These tips can assist in managing a hotel efficiently, even if your team consists of 100+ employees.

Employee management software for hospitality

With robust employee management software for hotels, you can more effectively schedule employees and flexibly replace them in emergencies.

• Assign staff shifts based on job roles and availability.
• Use drag and drop, assign shifts in bulk, set recurring shifts, create customisable templates, and even let employees claim open shifts available.
• Easily resolve scheduling issues with overtime alerts, limits alerts, or scheduling conflict alerts.
• Send push notifications to employees, allowing them to accept or reject shifts immediately from their mobile devices.
• Include shift tasks, notes, and even files within the schedule, so employees know exactly what to do upon arrival to work.
• Complete oversight of collaborative staff scheduling in real-time, all while on the move.

Communication is the cornerstone of effective hotel management. Yet, it can be a complex task to provide it. Thanks to modern automation tools, you can delegate part of the communication and interaction processes with your staff to such solutions. Today, Shifton offers hotel businesses a multipurpose automation tool that aids with staff management, shift management, managing emergencies, 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 keeps improving a tool for selecting and deploying medical staff for shifts, introducing the nurse schedule template. There’s no doubt now that efficient planning plays a crucial role in healthcare, ensuring that hospitals and clinics operate effectively. Let’s discuss how a chosen nurse scheduling app or template aids in online schedule planning.

Nurse Schedule Templates: What Is It?

Nurse schedule templates are like the backbone of the hospital nurse shift management system. They’re pre-made documents that help managers plan when their nursing teams work. These schedules cover all sorts of shifts, from day to night. Plus, they take into account each staff member’s preferences, like when they can and can’t work, to keep everyone content and the schedule running smoothly.

How do Nurse Schedule Templates Boost Hospital and Clinic Management?

Nurse schedule templates are extremely important for running hospitals and clinics smoothly. Many healthcare places are using them to simplify nurse staffing schedules, and here’s why:

No Mess: These templates help reduce mistakes in scheduling, so you don’t end up short-staffed and scrambling to cover shifts. Managers can easily spot gaps or overlaps and fix them to ensure there’s always someone on duty.

Time Saver: Using healthcare staff scheduling templates or apps saves a lot of time compared to making schedules from scratch each week. Adjust a pre-made template or update an app instead.

Happy Nurses: Nursing is challenging, so keeping nurses happy is essential. Using these templates means nurses get clear, fair schedules they can plan around. That leads to 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 feeling like someone’s getting special treatment. It’s all about teamwork and ensuring patients receive top-notch 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’d expect. It’s a one-time task that will save you time in the long run. Here are 5 easy 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 up their game regarding nurse scheduling to enhance clinical and business outcomes. Crafting a nurse shift schedule is just the beginning; to make it work for everyone, check out these six tips:

Use Nurse Scheduling Software

Nurse scheduling software is fantastic because it keeps everything clear and transparent, so your team always knows when and where they work. Say goodbye to old-school Excel sheets and give shift scheduling software like Shifton a go. It makes scheduling a breeze, even with the medical staff’s hectic and ever-changing schedules. Plus, it handles time-off requests and keeps track of attendance and payroll — all in one handy spot.

Consider What Your Staff Want

When sorting out schedules, consider what your nursing crew prefers. It’s an easy way to keep them happy, lift their spirits, and retain them. Some folks prefer specific shifts, while others might wish to avoid working on particular days. Working around these preferences will make your team happier and less likely to leave.

Have Backup Plans

Life’s unpredictable, so be ready for emergencies. While it’s unfortunate, these things happen, and they can disrupt the shift schedule, especially during those significant hospital shift changes. It’s beneficial if you have an on-call nurse who can always step in to help when needed, just like many clinics do.

Keep Your Schedule Updated

Don’t let your schedule gather dust. Make sure you keep an eye on the nurse’s schedule and refresh it now and then. That way, it stays current with any changes in staff availability, hospital needs, etc. The last thing you want is for your team to check an outdated schedule and miss shifts or show up late, disrupting the whole nurse shift change routine.

Give Your Nurses Some Rest

Make sure your nurses get enough downtime between shifts to recharge. When nurses don’t get enough sleep, they’re more likely to experience needlestick injuries and deal with health issues like hypertension, obesity, diabetes, depression, and heart problems. Plus, 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 hiccups, unlike humans, who can mess things up.

Good Communication Is Key

Keeping your team informed about their schedules is critical to keeping everyone happy and avoiding mix-ups. Want to keep the good vibes flowing in your crew? Always keep them informed about what’s happening and any upcoming changes. Using a nurse scheduling app where everyone can easily check in? That’s a great idea!

Final Thoughts

Using nurse staffing software makes managing your workload simpler and increases productivity. When this critical task isn’t done well, it can cause problems for nurses, nurse leaders, hospitals, and patients. Poor scheduling can also make nurses unhappy and cost hospitals a lot in overtime pay. That’s where Shifton helps out! 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 rolling out. They’re all about making shift planning easier, reducing paperwork, and helping nurses balance work and life.

Give Shifton software a go today for smoother nursing management.

Sticking to the schedule is one of the most crucial aspects of any company’s work process. Professionals need to value their time and use it wisely during working hours. Workers can make their job less stressful by following the advice below.

Knowing your limits is one of the simplest time management tips

Don’t hesitate to speak to your management if you encounter difficulties. It’s better to clarify things early on rather than wait for the situation to get out of hand. For instance, if you need to book accommodation for a business trip, ensure you reserve the correct number of rooms in a suitable part of town. You should also enquire about any budget constraints.

You can’t always manage everything on your own. There’s no shame in asking for help from your co-workers. If you’ve been assigned a task beyond your capabilities, you can spread the work among some of your colleagues. This is possible if, for example, you’re responsible for front-end work on an entire website. You might allocate some pages to other programmers. This way, you’ll avoid unnecessary exhaustion and increase your chances of completing the assignment on time.

Don’t waste your time

Regardless of what happens, you should remain focused on your duties. Don’t spring from your chair the moment your boss leaves the office. Concentrate on your work instead of wandering around the office and chatting with colleagues. We recommend creating a detailed work plan to keep yourself on track.

Try to avoid distractions. There’s nothing wrong with calling friends and whānau now and then. However, this can become a bad habit if phone calls and texting get out of hand.

Organise your workspace

Respecting your work desk is one of the top time management tips. Pay special attention to where your documents are stored so you don’t waste valuable time searching for them. Note down all of your assignments in a work journal or digital document. Otherwise, you risk forgetting them. You also shouldn’t eat where you work. This reduces concentration and can make you drowsy.

Be punctual

Try to arrive at work and leave on time. Taking too many days off without a valid reason or without notifying your managers is unwise. If you wish to leave work early, inform your manager about it.

Don’t keep colleagues waiting for your part of the job to be completed. Especially if you’re working on a large project and others rely on you. Your inaction or slow work will impact their progress.

It seems that many of us are capable of organising our time and the time of our employees properly and in a rational way. If that’s the case, why are we so often faced with the lack of this prominent, valuable and sadly finite resource? At first, it seems that we do everything right: jot down plans in our notebooks, minimise distractions and stick to our goals. Perhaps the root cause of our losses and time deficit lies in failing to follow effective time management principles? 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 need 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 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 maximum number of set tasks in the shortest time possible;

• Time management process helps to set our work priorities straight;

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

• By following proper time management models you will have time for leisure, family, and an active 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 used in achieving specific goals and completing essential 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 setting, 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 “Reframing Organizations: Artistry, Choice, and Leadership” book 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 was 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, to make your and your employee’s work effective and successful, you have to move away from 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 meet deadlines.

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

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

• You have to be in complete control of how employees work on certain tasks and projects. We’re not suggesting you should constantly control every aspect of the work process. 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 must have self-discipline as well as the ability to control their subordinates, be self-collected, and make rational and consecutive decisions.

Of course, one shouldn’t forget about self-discipline as it is important for employees at any level: from the highest to the lowest. When both you and your employee are orderly and considerate, planning effective time management will be easy. If you don’t have a proper level of self-organisation and aren’t that good at setting your priorities straight, you will find it difficult 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 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, and will be oriented towards the people who surround you.

Being a real estate agent involves numerous tasks, massive data, and ongoing communication with property sellers, buyers, and developers, although much of these can be delegated to specialised software for real estate management. Surprised? Let’s delve into how property management and scheduling software aids businesses in maintaining top-notch services and, therefore, high customer satisfaction.

To thrive in the competitive real estate scene, staying ahead of other agents is essential. This means not limiting yourself to one area and getting as many property offers to sell as possible. A real estate showing scheduler can be a valuable tool to streamline your business and team.

Real estate scheduling apps do more than just manage calendars. They also assist with multiple tasks you might have:

• managing your packed agendas;
• securing more listing appointments;
• organising cleaners’ visits and decorators’ work in the pre-showing phase;
• calculating payroll for your staff if you own a real estate agency;
• facilitating easy and effective communication within your team.

A well-organised schedule will maximise your appointments and showings, directly impacting your commission cheque.

The Features of the Best Property Management Software in 2024

Let’s explore how real estate management software can simplify your daily routines, highlighting features particularly useful for real estate agents:

Job scheduling option

When you have a team, scheduling their work, distributing the workload, and overseeing their assignments is crucial for flawless agency operations that attract clients and thus, profit. Modern real estate scheduling software lets you build optimal schedules based on each employee’s availability and job qualifications. With Shifton, for example, you can input all vital information like location and tasks and share assignments with your team online, ensuring your staff have everything they need to perform best via their mobile phones. This allocation avoids mistakes and overlaps through a well-organised real estate scheduler.

Digital tasks, forms, and checklists for streamlined operations

A shared platform for simultaneous work with your team streamlines overall workflow. This feature is useful for both your employees’ tasks and your own task management plans.

• You quickly create tasks and assign them to your employees,
• You maintain a clear real-time overview of their progress through real estate scheduling software, whether it’s single maintenance requests or routine inspections and cleaning jobs.
• You can provide all the information your employees need, including notes and deadlines, to ensure tasks are completed on time.
• In a real estate scheduler like Shifton, you can create custom reports, forms, and checklists for your staff to complete, use electronic signatures for identification, and submit back for review to ensure everything’s in order and compliant.

Manage your facilities with ease

As a real estate agency owner, freelance agent, inspection service provider, or facility management business, you need an eye on all your resources. Real estate software for property management lets you list, manage, and assign tasks related to your facilities. The primary benefits include:

• Flexibly managing each facility or real estate asset and detailing all the information with real estate management software.
• Assigning housing for sale to your staff to distribute responsibilities.

Ensure the safety and performance of your field staff

Real estate shift scheduling software equips brokers, agents, inspectors, and field staff with tools including digital safety forms and secure sign-in/out sites. With apps like Shifton, field staff complete reports and checklists remotely from their mobile devices, simplifying their workflow.

Enhance customer experience

Shifton exemplifies the best planner for real estate agents, delivering features to elevate customer experiences with these built-in tools:

• Automated appointment confirmations and reminders to prevent missed appointments.
• Quick replacement scheduling if an agent can’t complete an appointment, enabling seamless operations and maintaining customer loyalty.
• Location pairing for fast proximity worker dispatch to customers, saving time and cutting costs on long-distance appointments.
• Comment sections for sharing previous job details and providing feedback while employees are onsite.
• Virtual meeting features to enhance team-building and ensure quick communication in a single online workspace.
• Intelligent job matching and automated staff scheduling based on business priorities to consistently meet SLAs. For instance, property valuation firms can promptly assign available workers to new jobs to achieve tight timelines for significant clients.

Transferring numerous operations to the real estate scheduling software online field yields benefits from process streamlining to speeding up deal completion and elevating customer service.

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

The primary advantages of specialised real estate management software include its supportive functions and the well-thought-out tools integrated within.

• Enhances efficiency by automating complex, repetitive daily tasks and processes, freeing up time to focus on broader objectives.
• Facilitates organisation, management, and tracking of critical information and procedures on a centralised platform. It also allows instant sharing with your staff using cloud technologies.
• Acts as a security leverage for your business, providing a protected platform for sensitive data management like tenant, seller, buyer, and landlord personal details and payments, safeguarded from leaks by comprehensive protection levels.
• Offers real-time insights, a clear overview of system-managed data, and instant worker feedback. This keeps you informed and enables prompt, deliberate decision-making.

Gone are the days when paper planners and calculators were sufficient for real estate success. To outpace competitors and attract more clients and deals, you must be swift, client-focused, make agile decisions, and promote team synergy. Technology helps achieve all these. In 2024, a real estate scheduler is essential for agents and agency owners. Moreover, if your scheduler is as sophisticated as Shifton, it delivers further advantages, creating an effective communication ecosystem for your team.

The retail sector is highly lucrative and in demand, yet it has several hidden pitfalls that can lead to inefficiencies in retail management. There’s no need to fear them as retail management tips from Shifton can help you tackle the challenges on your way to achieving the most efficient retail management workflow.

The first thing an effective retail manager should consider is that this business requires you to manage a diverse range of tasks and processes daily. Think of it as a non-stop flow of water you need to control. This involves overseeing all store employees, delegating various tasks to them, managing their completion, and simultaneously being part of a team to foster synergy. Sound a bit out there? It’s real when you have informational support and know how to synergize your retail team’s work. Shifton shares the most effective retail staff management tips to help you with that.

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

A retail manager manages a retail store, assists with management, or oversees a specific department. Since retail stores can range from small businesses with a few hundred feet of storefronts to large warehouses, malls, and supermarkets owned by big corporations, the duties and tasks of a retail manager can vary. Moreover, they vary from day to day depending on the current load on a sales point or a department, customer flow, and even seasonality.

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

• arranging the store environment to be ergonomic and appealing to customers;
• managing store employees, their tasks, and outcomes;
• maintaining and tracking goods available in stock;
• monitoring, mitigating, and preventing shoplifting losses;
• providing customer service that relies on your assistance;
• tracking sales over set periods and providing reports to higher executives.

In brief, a retail manager is someone responsible for the overall functionality and effectiveness of a sales point.

How to be a good retail manager

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

Retail scheduling is essential!

Your sales point should operate like clockwork to be profitable. For this, you need your staff to start their work on time and work synchronously. So, even for a small grocery shop, you need to implement proper retail scheduling. Regular and logical shifts in supermarkets or malls are an absolute must.

Although scheduling in the retail industry can be a headache, the solution is simple and lies in modern retail scheduling software. With it, you don’t need to remember vast amounts of data or jot them down on paper tables to decide on time-off requests, vacations, emergencies, busy times, quiet times, sick days, etc. Instead, you use an automated tool to input new variables and data as needed.

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

• Deciding on the best combination of employees for each shift to make their work 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 can optimize shift work schedules in just a few moves, creating optimal shift schedules instantly.
• Distribution of schedules and shifts is also managed by retail employee scheduling software. Your team has access to the dashboard in the app and can easily find out when their shifts are or propose changes if they face obstacles. You can organise everything in the cloud so it’s available anywhere, anytime, and instantly alerts your retail team to any changes. Each employee can propose changes to the schedule, independently swap shifts, and receive alerts of work schedule changes.

The great thing about employee scheduling software for retail is that it automates anything 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 assigning shifts to employees including overtime.

Retail manager tasks

Task management is also a part of retail staff management routines. You need to highlight daily tasks, decide who will execute them, track their completion, and report on the results. The good news is 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 you can also plan your days and provide checklists for yourself so as not to miss anything. You can set priorities, monitor the completion of each assignment, and provide notifications about crucial tasks and timelines for both you and your team.

Use effective time management

When we said your sales point should work like clockwork, we also meant effective time management. If your shop assistants are constantly late, couriers can’t manage timely deliveries, or your warehouse team forgets about stock supply, what then? A complete mess! Yet this too can be automated to mitigate the risks we’ve mentioned. You need to apply time and attendance management software for retail. Shifton offers this feature in its retail scheduling software for large businesses. The same applies to periods of downtimes when there are fewer customers, and most employees are not engaged in workflow. Good time management lets you provide flexible solutions for your team: when you need them to start work, when you need more staff in the store to handle heavy customer flow, and when you can give them days off without affecting the store’s efficiency. Just try implementing time management in Shifton, and you might be surprised by how easy it is when automated and streamlined.

Hire a high-quality team

The effectiveness of your store or department starts with your team. You can have some assistant managers if you’re managing a large department to delegate recruiting and headhunting tasks, and you can use retail scheduling software to monitor the efficiency of each worker to replace them if they’re not meeting your standards or are slacking off.

Utilise retail scheduling software

As you can see, many retail management routines can be simplified with retail employee scheduling software. With this software, you can achieve higher results in areas such as:

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

From a broader perspective, it helps you build an effective management strategy and set achievable and logical goals for each sales point.

Focus on your store’s traffic

Traffic in a sales point indicates its profitability. You can use software to count customers and export reports on busy times. By knowing your store’s traffic and when you’re busiest, you can be better prepared for peak dates, like holidays, Black Fridays, or sales periods, and prevent emergencies. This helps you allocate adequate staff for the expected amount of customers and avoid scheduling large organisational tasks or restocking for times when the store will be full of customers.

Provide instant data tracking

Retail management is numbers-based: sales, visitors, stock levels, sold goods, revenue, and maintenance costs form the entire workflow. All this data requires your attention and precise calculation. Manually, it’s an arduous task, but still necessary. When you use retail scheduling software, you can keep all data in one place, operate it, and provide reports that quantify your management results.

What data should you check and process?

• Customer numbers;
• Sales figures;
• Number of items sold in specified periods;
• Working hours for each employee;
• Overtime work;
• Peak hours in your store.

Then you can use this data to analyse the overall work and improve it when needed.

How to enhance the management of a retail team?

Effective team management in retail 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 specific needs. Don’t be afraid to try some of them to determine 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. 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.
• Don’t just stay cooped up in the office. Exchange shifts, weekends, and sick days online to save time and stay mobile.
• Motivate your employees with overtime bonuses—these can easily be calculated using 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 guarantee that there will always be enough staff in the store to provide customer service.
• Work with attendance to understand when a person actually starts and ends the shift. If you notice some of your staff are consistently late, you can impose penalties for poor performance in the same way you calculate bonuses.

Simplify Rostering

With a robust employee communication app, you can more efficiently roster employees 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 phones.
• Include shift tasks, notes, and even files within the roster so employees know exactly what to do upon arrival at work.
• Complete oversight over collaborative staff rostering in real-time all while on the go.

Being an effective retail manager is not an impossible mission, whether managing a small shop 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 create the best team.
• Flawless employee rostering 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 simplified, time-saving, and effective.

Have you ever encountered a product like a restaurant scheduling app? If not, perhaps it’s time to think about which processes, assignments, and routines could be handled with special software for personnel management in restaurants. Gain expertise from Shifton’s developers to integrate the best features of such products into your workflow.

Being a restaurant manager is like running a never-ending race. You have to tackle multiple tasks simultaneously and oversee numerous staff, from chefs and sous-chefs to couriers, suppliers, cleaners, and more. Plus, various emergencies can disrupt the process, and it’s entirely your responsibility to handle them, although standard tasks can’t be postponed. All of this, on top of everyday tasks from scheduling to payroll to reporting, can really catch up with you.

Still, you’re not alone in this relentless routine, because Shifton takes care of restaurant managers by simplifying their lives with a single tool that can be a skeleton key for you.

You probably aren’t surprised by the automation in the restaurant business. Nonetheless, a special app for restaurant management can help you start spending more time doing what you enjoy and save your sanity.

Restaurant management tips for happy employees’ benefits

Whether you’re using sales forecasts and labour targets to create restaurant employee schedules or processing payroll, Shifton provides you with the tools you need every step of the way. With Shifton’s scheduling app for restaurants, you can automate and manage the following processes in a streamlined manner:

• Track working hours accurately for each employee;
• Reduce time theft and buddy punching in your restaurant;
• Empower your team members to give your customers the best service possible.

The best approach for achieving a happy crew is by communicating with them. In a single restaurant, this is already complex as everyone is always on the move. So, what about network establishments? With Shifton’s restaurant management app, you provide your staff with a communication channel to connect with each other and with you. You’ll see in real-time how communication in a shared environment reduces misunderstandings and numerous setbacks and how it builds higher loyalty from your staff and makes them happier, even while their workload stays the same.

Improve your personnel’s performance with work 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 the scheduled time. Imagine not scheduling your cleaners to prepare the restaurant’s hall to meet visitors at its best. You need waiters to be strictly ready to start serving customers on time. Your reputation is at risk if any part of this operation fails due to scheduling errors.

Using an automated restaurant staff scheduler is like having a magic key. It helps increase employees’ productivity and boost your revenue. Let’s look at how to choose the right type of schedule for your establishment and which tips to use to make it work seamlessly.

Scheduling software for restaurants

With personnel management software, you can create a set of basic scheduling policies and adhere to them. This forms the basis for the whole operation and helps you determine how far in advance you will publish schedules and how far in advance employees need to make time-off requests. You can also include setting minimum hours for each employee or designating specific shifts as high-traffic (and thus better 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 must work.
• You demonstrate good time management skills, thus confirming your professionalism in your employees’ eyes.
• You motivate your staff to pick high-traffic shifts to earn more tips.

Employee engagement

Here, we come to the next step. You need to maintain the highest level of engagement of your team to ensure your restaurant operates flawlessly. 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 gives managers and employees a handy communication channel, helping your team feel supported and engaged at work.

Employee retention

In the restaurant business, employee turnover appears natural, but it poses a significant challenge, as finding and hiring real pros who won’t let you down is tough. Running your restaurant efficiently means showing your employees that you respect their time and value their talents, thus keeping them engaged and loyal to their jobs. An effective restaurant management system is a crucial part of creating a positive environment. So, don’t overlook the staff you have, but instead, evaluate their efficiency to decide whether to strengthen the team with new employees or motivate your current personnel to work better. With Shifton’s software for restaurant management, you can assess the efficiency of each worker using various parameters, including working hours, overwork, customer satisfaction levels, etc.

Fast notifications and reminders

Do you want your staff to perform their duties to the highest standard? Is it essential for them to handle multiple tasks you assign? Don’t even leave a chance to miss something or forget about assignments. 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 set them to be sent to employees’ mobile devices at a specified time. The same applies to alert messages in emergencies, notifications about corporate events, or future team-building meetings if you hold them.

Collect data and use it thoughtfully

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

Improve productivity with hi-tech 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 operational efficiency and streamlined communication using software solutions, this results in a less stressful work environment for everyone.

Which types of technologies are safeguarding the restaurant business? Let’s consider it.

Employee scheduling software

With automation, you can leave behind the 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:

• Fast schedule creation with just a few clicks, which is available in Shifton as easy-to-use templates.
• Simple distribution of information about schedules and shifts among your employees.
• Flexible adjustments and changes to the schedule, which you can make online from anywhere in the world.
• Convenience of tracking working hours, overwork, missed shifts, or days off.

Task management software

Setting tasks with specialised staff management software? That is truly the best way to keep your restaurant running smoothly. In Shifton, you can make 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 be overlooked 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 reduce setbacks and check missed or forgotten items. Task management software maintains a record of completed tasks, allowing you to review it and gather the information that you need.

Employee communications tools

When it comes to employee communications, texting and phone calls are the most common channels. However, they are not ideal for restaurants where each worker is constantly on the move and has no time to check SMSs or answer calls. The best approach is to provide your employees with a shared environment for communication with you and each other. In terms of a restaurant management system, it is useful for the following reasons:

• You can easily contact each employee.
• They can communicate with one another to avoid misunderstandings and buddy punches.
• You can monitor the entire working process just by checking the information your employees share with others. If something goes amiss, you’re among the first to know about it.

Shifton provides a secure, business-focused communication tool that allows you to share schedules and announcements instantly. It also makes it easier for your employees to request time off and address payroll concerns like missing punches.

Timekeeping for restaurants

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

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

Payroll automation

Using restaurant employee management software is a brilliant alternative to hiring a payroll specialist or adding extra work to your accounting department for salary calculations. Instead, you can track all working hours and instantly calculate payroll in Shifton. This automates wage calculations, overtime pay, and tax and benefit withholdings. With no reliance on manual calculations, you’ll have fewer payroll errors and spend less time in front of the computer.

Since every type of software we’ve mentioned is useful, having all of them in one tool is a godsend. That’s what Shifton provides for restaurant managers. Payroll software syncs directly with your time clock and scheduling software in Shifton, giving you a unified environment for most management tasks and operations.

What are the benefits of restaurant management software?

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

• A shared environment for managers and staff to communicate and give 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, which can be used by managers and team members at different levels.
• It automates most processes you used to keep in mind or handle manually.

Thus, by using restaurant management software, you enhance the overall restaurant business operation, eliminate the chances of mistakes and issues, and manage your team more easily. The results are beneficial for you as a manager, as you work efficiently and stress-free, and for your team, as its members can satisfy their customers and receive due rewards for their efforts.