Making the most of a seasonal workforce 

Mark Williams at WorkJam describes how organisations can allow seasonal workers to step in seamlessly to help with an increase in demand and make the most of flexible shift opportunities 

With the exam season now over, a pool of short-term seasonal workers is ready and willing to meet additional staffing needs during one of the retail industry’s busiest times. Consumer spending in shops, bars and restaurants has already been supercharged following the Euros and, most recently, the Olympics. With the Paralympics about to get underway and the return of the Premier League, the summer of sport rolls on.

At the same time, retailers are looking to make the most of this window of opportunity, which will soon open once again in the lengthy run-up to Christmas. As they recruit seasonal staff to meet increased demand, however, effective scheduling has become vital to ensure shift patterns are filled and workers get the opportunities they are looking for.

In particular, peak shopping seasons mean temporary workers can arrive at short notice and sometimes in significant numbers. Retailers everywhere will be familiar with the problems associated with chaotic and error-prone scheduling. Many try to address the challenges by implementing a general schedule and asking workers to swap shifts to meet the overall requirement.

The key issue here is that most employers simply don’t have an effective process for meeting this need. For example, many still use paper-based shift-swapping systems or rely on staff to call or message each other to organise schedules. This can easily result in miscommunication and confusion, with employers having little to no visibility of who is scheduled to work and when.

Similarly, employees don’t always get the hours or shift patterns they are looking for, while businesses are understaffed and more likely to experience high employee turnover.

Shifting the dial

So, how can employers bridge the gap between seasonal sales opportunities and employee scheduling? Clearly, when people are with an employer for a short period of time, it can be difficult to optimise efficiency, but there is a range of proven processes employers can adopt to give all stakeholders the flexibility they are looking for.

The first step is to ensure there are clear communication processes in place. For example, HQ should communicate directly with frontline workers rather than location-based management, which can often act as a bottleneck. This frees managers to concentrate on their own priorities and can help them reclaim valuable time. 

In addition, assigning tasks to shifts rather than specific people can help ensure jobs are completed no matter who is working on a particular day. Boosted by the increased productivity this approach brings, many employers find this enables them to recover the hours equivalent to hiring another full-time employee.

Then there’s the benefits of self-service scheduling, where employees can match shift opportunities with when they want to work. Not only do managers save huge amounts of time that would otherwise be given over to planning but it also gives seasonal workers the flexibility they need.

Take Aramark, the global food service and facilities services provider, as an example. To manage the staffing for five sell-out concerts at Croke Park, Dublin, with 8,000 seats per night, Aramark remobilised its casual team by allowing them to manage their shifts and make their own schedules using Open Shift Marketplace capabilities. All open shifts, (approx. 3,000) were filled three weeks before the concert. 

Empowering employees

Optimising the efficiency of seasonal and temporary workers can also be extended to how employers implement training. For example, shifting to an ‘in-the-flow-of-work’ training process can significantly boost productivity. Instead of relying on temporary employees to retain and recall information and content over the short term, training content can be repurposed into bite-sized segments that people can refer to as they work.

When combined with access to e-learning content and tools, employees spend less time in traditional training environments and more time learning while doing. Any employer that can seamlessly deliver these capabilities will usually see better recruitment, retention and productivity benefits than those who can’t.

To close the loop, it’s a good idea to put processes in place to gather employee feedback. While some employers may be tempted to assume that the views and experiences of permanent staff are more informative, seasonal employees can provide vital insight. This can include everything from understanding how scheduling processes are working to situations where somebody new to the business brings a fresh perspective and can spot novel ways to improve productivity and efficiency.

The underlying point is that seasonal workers are an important employee cohort, and without them, many retailers would struggle to bring customers’ value and maximise the sales opportunities that only come at specific times of the year. As such, their effectiveness depends on providing them with the tools and resources to do their jobs with maximum flexibility and efficiency.

Without these capabilities, retailers can find themselves distracted by the need to fill roles instead of driving profits. In contrast, employers who strike the right balance can also reap the benefits of greater employee retention, better reputation and access to a larger pool of people to meet their seasonal needs. 

Mark Williams is Managing Director, EMEA at WorkJam

Main image courtesy of iStockPhoto.com and Moyo Studio