Profitable Rotas in 6 Simple Steps.

6 simple steps to help you plan rotas that control costs and improve productivity.

Ciaran avatar
Written by Ciaran
Updated over a week ago

Covid 19 has had a significant impact on how we run and manage our businesses.

Our retail clients tell us that whilst overall sales have generally increased, margins have been affected by reductions in higher margin products and services with more people continuing to work from home and fewer people commuting.. 

Creating efficient rotas and managing wage costs has never been more important.  

In this short article we present 6 simple steps to how rota planning with Scheduler can help you achieve this.

You can also book an online demo with a member of our team  - click here  

Step 1 - Create Separate Rotas for each Profit Centre

You can create as many rotas as you need with Scheduler.  

Creating a rota for each profit centre can help you determine the optimal number of shifts and hours you need daily and weekly in order to meet your sales, costs and productivity targets.

Step 2 - Enter Staff Holidays

Record annual leave before you start assigning shifts.

Scheduler will automatically calculate holiday pay  for each staff member based upon their terms of employment and entitlements.     

This cost will be included as part of the over all wage cost for your rota.

Step 3 - Enter Projected Sales 

Enter your daily sales targets for your department and the system will calculate an overall weekly target.

Once you start assigning shifts to employees the system automatically calculates two key productivity metrics.

  1. Wage Costs as a Percentage of Sales

Knowing your optimal wage cost to sales target helps ensure you can operate profitably.

2. Sales Per Hour Worked 

Knowing the sales achieved for each hour worked provides valuable insight into the productivity and efficiency of your business.

It tells you how each department performs week by week enabling you to quickly identify and respond to issues as they arise.

Step 4 - Set Your Wage Cost Budget

Once the sales targets have been defined, you can set a budget for your wages.

Most businesses will aim to keep wage costs on or below a defined percentage of sales.  

If your sales target is £10,000 and you aim to keep wage costs at 15% of sales, then set your wage budget at £1,500.

Step 5 - Create and Assign Shifts to Staff

You are now ready to start building your rota and assigning shifts to employees.  

Scheduler is packed full of features to help you do this quickly and efficiently.  Click here for articles and help guides that will show you how.  

Managing your Budget 

Each time you add a new shift, Scheduler automatically updates your daily and weekly wage costs as well as your wage cost/sales % and sales per hour worked

If you exceed your budget the system will alert you, giving you the opportunity to make the necessary changes to get you back on target.

Step 6 - Publish your Rota

Once finished, publish your rota.  All staff receive instant notifications by sms and email.

Your staff can also login and check their rota, at anytime, from any device. 

Managing Your Rota 

Our clients tell us that managing a rota is a process not an event.  

Changes in staff availability and customer demand throughout the working week means that managers continually have to adapt their rotas.

Scheduler makes tracking these changes simple and easy and it can be done from any location or device with staff receiving notifications of any changes that affect them.

By updating your projected sales with actual sales each day, Scheduler will instantly recalculate your productivity metrics and costs and enable you to make the necessary changes to stay on target as your week evolves.

To learn more about how Scheduler can benefit your business why not book a demo with our team - Click Here  

You can also register for a FREE Trial  - Click Here

      


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