Sponsored by When I Work
In the food service industry, franchise owners and their employees are constantly juggling a variety of different duties to keep the business running smoothly: customer service, marketing, finances, and more. But one of the biggest responsibilities that can make or break a franchise is good employee management.
Effective scheduling is a huge piece of this puzzle. Here are four tips on how franchises can improve their scheduling game to be more effective for business profitability.
Tip #1: Use scheduling software
If your employee schedule is still a spreadsheet or a piece of paper in the break room, it’s time for an upgrade.
Scheduling employees by hand can take managers countless hours every few weeks to figure out what shifts need to be filled, employee availability, required credentials or training for certain roles, and more.
Adding a scheduling software allows users to quickly generate schedules, fill shifts, manage time off, and more in minutes instead of hours. Plus, creating a digital schedule means employees can check their shifts from anywhere vs. a communal calendar.
David Porto, co-owner of Blue Plate Catering in Madison, Wisconsin, used to spend more than 15 hours a week creating employee schedules, tracking hours by hand in a spreadsheet, and emailing updates. After adding When I Work, Porto was able to reduce his time spent on schedules and time sheets to only 20 minutes a week.
Tip #2: Optimize schedules to control for labor costs
With expenses like food prices constantly increasing, restaurant franchises should ensure that hidden labor costs aren’t eroding their profitability.
First, calculate how much of your dollar is going to labor. Simply divide total sales by total labor costs (including benefits and overtime). A good rule of thumb is labor costs should be 25-30% of sales for a quick-service or fast casual restaurant.
Once you figure out your labor cost percentage, take a look at how that number fluctuates in comparison to employee scheduling. Are there certain times of the day or week when labor expenses are outpacing sales? That could be a sign of too many people working a certain shift. Similarly, if overtime regularly happens during certain shifts, that’s a sign of an understaffed schedule, causing labor costs to spike.
Studying patterns in labor costs vs. revenue means you’ll be able to create an employee schedule that’s optimized to customer demand over time. Another source of savings? Creating and enforcing an overtime policy for employees that makes overtime the exception rather than the rule.
Using a software that tracks labor trends can be incredibly helpful to figure out a schedule that works best for your franchise. With When I Work, we’ve seen businesses save as much as 20% on labor costs by fine-tuning their employee schedules to maximize revenues.
Tip #3: Adopt flexible scheduling
Across the job market, there’s been increased demand for flexible scheduling, and the restaurant industry is no different. In its 2022 reports on summer and holiday hiring trends, Snagajob found that 50-60% of hourly workers wanted more flexibility in their schedules.
One option franchises should consider is a flexible self-scheduling model. Rather than assigning shifts, a manager builds a schedule based on demand, and then employees choose the shifts they’d like to work.
Not only does this save managers time, employees get a say in their work schedule and can better manage their job versus other life commitments, like school or parenting. Plus, flexible scheduling has been shown to decrease no-shows and increase productivity.
Tip #4: Eliminate just-in-time scheduling
The hourly service industry is notorious for schedules where shifts are added or dropped with little notice. This unpredictability makes it hard for employees to maintain a work-life balance, and in turn, this instability can increase turnover rates.
One study from The Shift Project found a 39% turnover rate for retail and food service workers who received their schedules with less than 72 hours’ notice. For those who got two weeks notice of their shifts, the turnover rate dropped to 24%.
Here are some scheduling commitments to consider making to employees to offer more predictability:
- Ensure employees get their schedules with advanced notice. Two weeks’ notice might be hard for many managers, but even getting schedules out one week ahead can greatly impact morale and loyalty.
- Avoid making last-minute changes to posted schedules. Unexpected events can always happen, but a good schedule should be able to run smoothly with few hiccups.
- Don’t use on-call shifts. If schedules are grounded in good customer demand data, there shouldn’t be a need to have employees waiting until the last minute to know if they’re working.
It may take some time to fine-tune the best employee schedule for your specific franchise, but the payoff is worth it: labor savings, happier employees, and more time to devote to other business tasks.
The When I Work workforce management platform is purpose-built to help shift-based workplaces create happier, more productive teams through employee scheduling, time tracking, team messaging, and more. To learn more, visit wheniwork.com.
