Employee Scheduling Software

Employee scheduling software enables teams to assign, monitor and manage shifts for workers across shift-based business operations. Typically part of overarching workforce management platforms, dedicated employee scheduling applications are now highly popular across industries that rely heavily on shift and roster-based work, such as restaurants/bars/cafes, hotels, airlines, hospitals and pretty much every round-the-clock retail customer service team.

Shifts are determined based on factors such as employee availability, skill-sets and labor laws, in order to ensure every employee is utilized resourcefully, and while staying compliant with relevant regulations. Additionally, employee scheduling software today also takes work-life balance into consideration, by providing employees autonomy to choose shifts that are personally convenient to them, or swap with other employees. All of this is now doable on the go; many top employee scheduling software providers offer mobile apps to check shift timings, calendars and even payroll.

Key Features of Employee Scheduling Software

• Shift management: Managers and employees alike can identify free time slots, assign shifts, and swap if needed, while managers approve or reject shift requests.
• Dynamic calendars: View your entire team's day-to-day engagements in a variety of layouts, from Kanban boards to Gantt charts, or a classic calendar.
• Time off management: Employees can submit time-off requests directly from their scheduling app or desktop console. For this purpose, integrating existing time and attendance software is useful, to facilitate a seamless flow of shift data for accurate payroll processing.
• Cross-application collaboration: Employee scheduling software can be integrated with productivity-focused tools such as project management software, so timely alerts can be generated to ensure your employees never miss a single shift.
• Reports and analytics: Identify patterns pertaining to over-staffing and under-staffing, skills shortages, or any compliance violations through real-time dashboards and reporting capabilities, inbuilt within employee scheduling software.