A schedule, often called a rota or roster, is a list of
employees
Employment is a relationship between two parties regulating the provision of paid labour services. Usually based on a contract, one party, the employer, which might be a corporation, a not-for-profit organization, a co-operative, or any othe ...
, and associated information e.g. location, department, working times, responsibilities for a given time period e.g. week, month or sports season.
A
schedule
A schedule or a timetable, as a basic time-management tool, consists of a list of times at which possible tasks, events, or actions are intended to take place, or of a sequence of events in the chronological order in which such things are i ...
is necessary for the day-to-day operation of many businesses e.g.
retail store,
manufacturing
Manufacturing is the creation or production of goods with the help of equipment, labor, machines, tools, and chemical or biological processing or formulation. It is the essence of secondary sector of the economy. The term may refer to a r ...
facility and some
offices
An office is a space where an organization's employees perform administrative work in order to support and realize objects and goals of the organization. The word "office" may also denote a position within an organization with specific dut ...
. The process of creating a schedule is called scheduling. An effective workplace schedule balances the needs of stakeholders such as
management
Management (or managing) is the administration of an organization, whether it is a business, a nonprofit organization, or a government body. It is the art and science of managing resources of the business.
Management includes the activities o ...
, employees and
customer
In sales, commerce, and economics, a customer (sometimes known as a client, buyer, or purchaser) is the recipient of a good, service, product or an idea - obtained from a seller, vendor, or supplier via a financial transaction or exchange for ...
s.
A ''daily'' schedule is usually ordered
chronologically
Chronology (from Latin ''chronologia'', from Ancient Greek , ''chrónos'', "time"; and , ''-logia'') is the science of arranging events in their order of occurrence in time. Consider, for example, the use of a timeline or sequence of events. It ...
, which means the first employees working that day are listed at the top, followed by the employee who comes in next, etc. A ''weekly'' or ''monthly'' schedule is usually ordered
alphabetically, employees being listed on the left hand side of a grid, with the days of the week on the top of the grid. In
shift work, a schedule usually employs a recurring
shift plan.
A schedule is most often created by a
manager
Management (or managing) is the administration of an organization, whether it is a business, a nonprofit organization, or a government body. It is the art and science of managing resources of the business.
Management includes the activities o ...
. In larger operations, a
human resources
Human resources (HR) is the set of people who make up the workforce of an organization, business sector, industry, or economy. A narrower concept is human capital, the knowledge and skills which the individuals command. Similar terms include m ...
manager or scheduling specialist may be solely dedicated to creating and maintaining the schedule. A schedule by this definition is sometimes referred to as
workflow
A workflow consists of an orchestrated and repeatable pattern of activity, enabled by the systematic organization of resources into processes that transform materials, provide services, or process information. It can be depicted as a sequence of ...
.
Software is often used to enable organizations to better manage staff scheduling. Organizations commonly use
spreadsheet
A spreadsheet is a computer application for computation, organization, analysis and storage of data in tabular form. Spreadsheets were developed as computerized analogs of paper accounting worksheets. The program operates on data entered in cel ...
software or
employee scheduling software to create and manage shifts, assignments, and employee preferences. For large organisations employee scheduling can be complex, and optimising this is framed as the
nurse scheduling problem in
operations Research
Operations research ( en-GB, operational research) (U.S. Air Force Specialty Code: Operations Analysis), often shortened to the initialism OR, is a discipline that deals with the development and application of analytical methods to improve deci ...
.
[Math.ed]
"Nurse scheduling problem"
/ref> Advanced employee scheduling software also provides ways to connect with the staff, ask for their preferences and communicate the schedule to them.
On-call scheduling
An On call shift or On-call scheduling is a practice which requires employees to be available to be called onto last-minute shifts without pre-scheduling.labor rights
Labor rights or workers' rights are both legal rights and human rights relating to labor relations between workers and employers. These rights are codified in national and international labor and employment law. In general, these rights influen ...
groups as "unfair and detrimental to employees."
Self-scheduling
Flexible self-scheduling is a practice used when a manager defines scheduling needs based on demand, but allows employees to select, trade, and fill shifts themselves. Allowing schedules to be created faster, with less effort, and gives hourly employees more control over their work life.
See also
* Field service management
* Gantt chart
* Split shift
References
Employment
Business process management
Time management
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