Employee scheduling software

Put simply, employee scheduling is the process and practice of creating a timetable for when your team members work.

For some businesses, it may be as simple as scheduling all your employees to work 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday in the same location.

For other businesses, it may be more complex, requiring that different employees work different shifts on different days of the week at different locations.

Regardless of the complexity, employee scheduling plays an important role in how your business operates.

First and foremost, employee scheduling provides structure and order to your business’s workday. Managers, team members, and everyone involved know when they’ll work and who will be there with them.

Employee scheduling also provides your team with a foundation on which they can build a beneficial work-life balance. And when your employees are happy and healthy, they’ll be better able to give your business what it needs to succeed.

More Time

One of the most significant benefits of using the Sling employee scheduling software is finding more time to focus on other aspects of your business.

When you incorporate Sling into your workflow, its ease of use and straightforward functionality will help you create the perfect schedule in minutes instead of hours.

With the time you save, you can give more attention to improving the way your team works and growing your business toward success.

Improved Access

Modern, cloud-based software like Sling makes it possible — and remarkably easy — to access your employee scheduling data anywhere, anytime.

It doesn’t matter if you’re on a desktop, laptop, tablet, or smartphone, as long as you can connect to the internet, you can create schedules, make changes, and communicate with your employees.

That’s connectivity you can’t get with other apps.

Fewer Errors

Experienced managers know that it’s incredibly easy to make mistakes that render a schedule all but useless. With Sling employee scheduling software, the program itself alerts you when it detects an error.

Sling incorporates a built-in artificial intelligence that keeps track of time off, hours worked, and other variables so that if you schedule something incorrectly, the software will notify you to make a change.

All businesses — regardless of size or niche — can benefit from employee scheduling.

The Sling suite of tools is perfect for:

• Healthcare
• Restaurants
• Retail
• Education
• Hotels
• Transportation
• Call centers
• Caregiving
• Entertainment
• Emergency
• Nonprofits
• Remote work

Even if your business doesn’t fall into one of those general categories, it can benefit from the power, flexibility, and organization that Sling provides to your employee scheduling.

Build Shifts Around Anchor Employees

When faced with employee scheduling, many managers start on Monday and work their way through to Sunday. While that certainly is a valid method for building a staff rota, there is a better way.

Instead of filling in all shifts on Monday, then all shifts on Tuesday, then all shifts on Wednesday, start by scheduling an “anchor” employee (typically one of your best) to each shift and then fill other employees in around them.

This ensures that the employees most suited for each shift (e.g., the lunch rush in a restaurant or the rush-hour shift in a gas station) are working when you need them.

It also ensures that you have a core of experience to provide stability across all shifts and on which your newest hires can rely.

Create A Backup Plan

Despite your best intentions, and no matter how hard you work to make your employee scheduling perfect, emergencies will come up.

Don’t let these emergencies cripple your business — plan for the worst.

The Sling software suite makes this planning much easier. With Sling’s cloud-based tools, you can create an availability chart of employees who might be willing to pick up an extra shift when another team member falls ill.

You can also use the employee scheduling software to compile a list of reliable part-time employees or employees who left your business on good terms that you can call if your backup plan falls through as well.

Establish A Labor Budget

Labor is one of the largest expenses your business is likely to face. To keep it under control, it’s essential to establish a labor budget and do everything possible to stay within those numbers when scheduling your employees.

Sling’s powerful software helps you set a labor budget that works for your operation. With Sling, you can create a schedule that keeps your labor expenses under control and under budget.

If your schedule exceeds the budget you’ve set, Sling will notify you immediately so you can make the necessary changes.

Customize Your Own Templates

Want to cut hours off your employee scheduling efforts? Create a template that you can reuse week after week after week.

Sling includes plenty of templates to help you streamline your scheduling process. You can even tailor the existing templates to your business’s specific needs so that you don’t have to recreate the wheel every time you want to build a new schedule.

When it’s time to sit down and create shifts for the next week, month, or quarter, the formatting, shift slots, and other relevant information are already there.

This allows you to focus on scheduling the right employee at the right time and place to make your business run smoothly.

No matter the size of your business, Sling helps you conquer and complete your employee scheduling in minutes rather than hours.

With Sling’s powerful suite of tools, you can:

• Manage time off
• Coordinate availability
• Organize shift trade requests
• Stay on (or under) budget
• Reduce absenteeism
• Minimize late arrivals
• Allow your employees to sign up for available shifts
• Consolidate and streamline internal communication
• Control labor costs
• Simplify time tracking and payroll
• And much, much more…

You can even benefit from Sling’s built-in artificial intelligence that notifies you of overlapping shifts, double-bookings, and other mistakes and conflicts in your schedule.

Sling truly is an all-in-one, turnkey solution for all of your employee scheduling issues.

Right now, you can get all the essentials to help you organize and optimize your workforce and and handle internal communication for up to 50 users for free with just one click.