How to Manage Effective Employee Scheduling

Nowadays, workers regard their staff advantages and bonuses as important as the actual salary they receive. The way you manage time-off requests directly, and the degree to which employees can pick up or swap shifts, impact the kind of people interested in working for you.
Implement limiting procedures for picking up shifts, and you’ll have a hard time to find top performers.
Make it challenging or unfair to get some time-off, and you’ll find it hard to retain your best employees. Avoid making policy and you’ll struggle to remain staffed during peak holiday times.
Picking up or swapping shifts is regarded to be directly related to the quality of life, and the liberty to maintain a balanced personal life away from the office as the requirement arises. It’s important to know how to deal with these requests appropriately and effectively.
Here are a few tips to bear in mind when drawing up such a policy, and suggestions regarding an effective employee scheduling app that could help the process:

Inform everyone of your new policies from the get-go

The first and most important aspects to note is that everyone in your organization should be notified of new policies that are implemented.
If employees are not aware of the boundaries that have been put in place for time-off, or when a shift has been swapped or picked up, you’ll have one of two results:
• Some personnel would continuously ask for time-off and any reason, because there are no limits. This could lead to resentment stemming from the other employees.
• Some staff members could be too cautious to ask, out of fear that their request will be declined. This could lead to frustration and burnout.

The Activity Feed feature of the Ezzely employee engagement app instantly notifies everyone in the organization when a message is sent. Click here to learn more about how it works.

Recognize top performance

Rewards are always better than punishment, and a lot of research has proven that our behavior changes much easier through praise than through complaints.
Consider rewarding staff that are willing to pick up shifts, work during vacations, weekends, or other peak times that are well-known for accompanying a mass of time-off requests.
The Rewards feature of the Ezzely employee scheduling app is easy to use and offer employees the opportunity to reward one another for a job well done.
Click here to learn more about how it works.

Keep track of shift swaps and time-off requests

Keeping track of the shift swap requests of personnel, including the date on which the requests were made, the reasons for the requests as well as the actual time-off is a crucial element in implementing a system that will work for everyone in the organization fairly.
This will help you identify problematic patterns and will enable you to provide fair and proper justifications for declining time-off requests where needed. You would also be able to identify the potential employees who rarely ask for time-off, who perhaps they deserve it, but aren’t confident enough to ask on their own.

The Pick Up Shift feature of the Ezzely employee scheduling app allows for time-off requests to be managed efficiently and effectively. Click here to learn more about how it works.
Managing time-off requests effectively is a combination of organized policies, leniency for emergencies, and a focused avoidance of partiality.

Allowing employees the opportunity to volunteer to pick up a shift will help them to feel that they are in control of their own lives, and not at the mercy of the whims of their manager.
Last note:
Are you ready to enjoy the many benefits of the effective management of employee scheduling in your organization?
We invite you to try Ezzely. Just click here to see how it works or sign up for a free trial here.