Clever Scheduling Can Go A Long Way — Perfect For Summer Vacation Season
Summer: the season for time off requests and lots of discussions about vacations. It can be challenging to support the entire team during the summer months. Team members and even other leaders are looking to spend time outside, traveling, and with friends and family. You also want to support and accommodate as many requests as possible, while still ensuring you can provide the right level of service to your customers and keep the business running. Is it possible to accomplish this? There are ways you can work with your team and find solutions to most, if not all, the needs with some conversation and creativity.
Be open and upfront
The best way to begin to support your team and their time-off needs is to let them know you want to help them get the time off they are looking for. Be honest with what you are trying to balance and why it is important to be thoughtful about scheduling and working with vacation requests. Your team, including part-time employees, will understand what is at stake. They have all been on both sides of the equation when they want time off, or seen what happens when someone calls out unexpectedly. They will want to ensure everything continues to run smoothly.
Gather information
Ask all employees, including other leaders, to submit their time-off requests for the entire summer. Have them provide whether their dates may be flexible or whether they are currently firm plans. That can help you prioritize which requests you work with first. As you receive the information, plot the dates on the calendar to see where you have overlap, and where accommodations can be made without issue. You may be able to complete this in your scheduling system if you have one. I still recommend doing this on your own and using simple paper and pencil. Use a blank calendar and just write down everyone’s request so you can see how they fall for each week.
Be creative
Take a look at how you might be able to string together several days without necessary using vacation time for the team, or where it may support other people’s needs. Giving someone a Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and Monday is a nice long weekend, and doesn’t use any vacation time. You may also have more flexibility over the weekend, with more people available during those times. It could be a workable option. For others, perhaps a mid-week stretch would work better. If someone could work Sunday, Friday, Saturday, even longer shifts, they could still get full-time hours in, and have a four-day stretch of time off. Even longer stretches can be made by spanning the weekend, adding Thursday and Tuesday to the long weekend concept mentioned above. There are many ways you can help your team find an extra day or two and support their need for time off and maintain their hours.
Facilitate trading
Helping your team work together to find days that everyone can work and support each other is not always the highest priority of the leadership team. However, it can be a way to create higher engagement levels, and be proactive about shift coverage. If you spot conflicts on requests and business needs, working with the team to find people to fill gaps or swap shifts may end up having you time and trouble in the long run. Having someone call out at the last minute because their time-off request was not granted is not fun for anyone. Try to head those problems off early. Yes, the potential for disciplinary action could be a deterrent, it doesn’t necessarily solve the problem and may end up creating additional issues. So, working ahead and working together may be the best bet for everyone.
Keep communicating
Let your team know you will continue to inform them and update them throughout the summer. There may even be instances where you offer extra days off to help manage summer sales dips. Again, combining these days with existing days off can provide more options for your team to escape to the beach or park for a few days to enjoy the sun and friends. Letting your team know along the way will ensure that no one is surprised or disappointed.
Every location is different and depending on the makeup of your team, your challenges for managing summer schedules could range from very simple to highly complex. These tips can assist in planning ahead and working with your team to ensure that everyone can enjoy some fun in the sun and time with friends and family throughout the summer.
What are some ideas you’ve used to ensure you can support your team during the summer months?
Quick Summary
Be open and upfront: Communicate with your team about the importance of balancing time-off requests with business needs, fostering understanding and cooperation.
Gather information: Collect all time-off requests for the summer, noting flexibility in dates, and plot them on a calendar to identify overlaps and accommodations.
Be creative: Explore scheduling options that provide long weekends or mid-week stretches without using vacation time, offering flexibility and maintaining hours.
Facilitate trading: Encourage team members to swap shifts or cover for each other to prevent last-minute call-outs and enhance engagement.
Keep communicating: Continuously update the team on scheduling throughout the summer, offering extra days off when possible to support their time-off needs.
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