Everything You Need to Know About Employee Scheduling

Are you trying to find ways to improve efficiency and productivity, while still ensuring all shifts are properly covered? This is a problem many businesses face, especially coming out of the Great Resignation.

Employee labor costs are increasing, more time off is needed, and work life balance is hard to maintain. Each of these issues can be improved with the right shift scheduling.

In this article, we’ll outline:

• The basics of employee scheduling
• How to optimize your shifts
• The typical scheduling process
• The different types of employee scheduling

What is a shift schedule?

A shift schedule, also known as an employee work schedule, is the method used to schedule employees in rotation. A rotating shift schedule ensures that your company is meeting business needs, and your employees are working an optimal number of hours.

Shift-based schedules are common with types of work like:

• Healthcare: ER staff, nurses, and doctors often work around the clock.
• Emergency services: Firefighters, police, and paramedics can't clock out when lives are on the line.
• IT support: Servers don't care about bedtime. IT pros are often on-call for tech meltdowns.
• Hospitality: Hotels run 24/7, so front desk and security staff often work in shifts.
• Transport & logistics: Think late-night truck drivers or cargo handlers at ports.
• Media: News doesn't sleep, so journalists and editors might be on-call for breaking stories.
• Utilities: Power grid operators and water treatment staff need to keep things flowing, day and night.

Proper shift scheduling relies on your ability to streamline operations. This might include using a time clock, timesheet, spreadsheets, or a scheduling app. Keeping everyone on the same page, including scheduling according to employee preferences, is important to optimize productivity and retention efforts.

What are the benefits of shift schedules?

Appropriate shift coverage benefits both your company and your employees by:

• Giving workers flexibility. If a family emergency comes up, how easily can you schedule changes to ensure you have the right coverage? Employees that have flexibility in the scheduling process are more likely to remain engaged in their positions.
• Ensuring fairness. Employee resentment can easily spark when they don’t believe a schedule is fair. For example, delivery employees who want to be on the schedule during the workday but are constantly scheduled on the night shift can harm your retention efforts. 

Shift scheduling can help you improve the functionality of your operations, and employee productivity, while meeting employee preferences.

Legal compliance is also easier with shift-based schedules. Labor laws require specific breaks and limit the number of hours your employees can work during the workweek. For example, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration outlines the following limitations for driver scheduling:

• Drivers are limited to 11-hour workdays, which must follow 10 consecutive hours off duty.
• Drivers must take a 30-minute break when they have driven for 8 cumulative hours. 
• Drivers cannot drive for more than 60 hours in 7 consecutive days. 
• Drivers cannot drive for more than 70 hours in 8 consecutive days. 

It’s essential that you stay in compliance with these regulations to avoid fines and penalties.

Staff scheduling can also increase your profitability. The most common work hours are day shifts. But if a delivery business is able to provide 24/7 delivery, it has access to an expanded customer base. Additionally, with staff available at your disposal around the clock, you have on-call opportunities for last minute, high profit deliveries.

Employee scheduling challenges

One of the biggest challenges to successful employee scheduling is accurate work allocation. Sure, scheduling more than one shift in a day can increase efficiency and help the business get more done — but packing 100 deliveries into a 6-hour shift is not reasonable. The likely result is delayed deliveries, unsatisfied customers, lost revenue — and a snowball effect as the problems spill over onto the next shift. 

So, having realistic expectations is one key to successful scheduling. This includes accurate estimations of how long it will take to complete each task, and an allowance for the unexpected. 

For instance, route optimization software like Routific can create delivery routes that take normal traffic patterns and scheduled road closures into account. It can even account for stops with tricky parking situations, or larger-than-normal deliveries that will take longer to offload. But traffic accidents, last-minute additions to the schedule, or even bad weather can upend any plan. A good schedule should leave just enough space to accommodate the unexpected without compromising efficiency. 

Compliance can also be a hassle if your work takes place in multiple jurisdictions. For example, labor laws that affect long-haul truck drivers can be different from state to state. One state may specify a maximum of 11 hours driving during a 14-hour window, another may have mandated breaks at different times. The inability to follow these regulations can result in fines and penalties associated with noncompliance.

Nine different types of employee shifts

Industry needs are diverse, so it makes sense that when it comes to workforce management, there are many different kinds of shift schedule. Here are a few of the most common shift patterns.

1: Fixed work schedule

In this schedule, employees work specific days and hours each week, clocking in and clocking out at the same time. A fixed work schedule makes it easier for full-time employees to plan their lives. 

If you live in a place where employees must work a minimum number of hours to qualify for certain healthcare plans, this kind of schedule is also an advantage for healthcare benefits. 

If you do plan on offering fixed work schedules, be sure you have the three main shifts covered. A common pattern in the US is:

1. First shift 8am-4pm
2. Second shift 4pm-12am
3. Third shift 12am-8am. 

Of course, your set shift times can vary based on your business needs and overlap during busy hours.

2: Rotating shifts

In a rotating shift schedule, employees have different hours each workday and workweek. This type of scheduling can help work life balance, and allows you to adjust for time off. For example, one of your employees might work early mornings one week and switch to the night shift the next week. It’s important you set up notifications of rotating shifts in advance, such as two weeks before.

3: 24/7 shifts

Sometimes, employees want to work all of their hours in one or two days. 24/7 shift coverage assigns an employee to be on-call for an entire 24 hours. Keep in mind that you need to implement the right shift strategies for 24-hour work. In a delivery business, for example, it’s not practical or safe to schedule deliveries for 24 hours straight. 

4: Split shift

Split shifts are another common staffing option. Split shifts separate your employee’s hours into two or more periods during the same day, for example from 7am-11am and then 5pm-8pm. Split shifts give your employees flexibility. Maybe they need to pick up their child from school or have a doctor’s appointment during the day. Whatever the case, giving your employees the option for split shifts can not only add flexibility, but improve productivity when they are scheduled during busy times.

5: Graveyard shifts

Graveyard shifts are used to describe overnight scheduling. These are typically 12-hour shifts scheduled into the night, such as 8pm-8am. 

6: On-call shifts

Some part-time employees only want to work on an as-needed basis, for example if a delivery business is behind on orders or needs to complete a quick delivery. On-call employees might charge more since they are dropping everything at a moment’s notice.

7: No-schedule shifts

No-schedule shifts are commonly used to fill coverage gaps or under-scheduled shifts. Many small businesses resort to this method to accommodate employee needs, but it can be difficult to maximize productivity and efficiency without a defined method.

8: DuPont scheduling

DuPont scheduling was originally created in the mid-20th century for industrial employees. This method follows a 12-hours on, 12-hours off scheduling approach. Under this method, your employees will only work 3-4 days a week. For example, you might schedule an employee for three 12-hour shifts in a row Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. They would then have the entire week, from Monday to Thursday, off.

9: 2-3-2 and four-on, four-off shifts

These shift types schedule workers in day blocks. For example, the 2-3-2 schedule has employees working 2 days on, 3 days off, and then 2 days on again. The four-on, four-off schedule follows a similar manner, with employees working four straight days, then having four days off. The hours associated with these scheduling types can vary, from 12-hour shifts to 24-hour shifts.