Like most business owners, you probably constantly look for ways to boost your team’s morale, increase productivity, reduce operating costs, and ensure the longevity of your business. Many of your fellow business owners have found workforce management solutions to be the answer.
Key Takeaways:
- Workforce management encompasses the strategy and applicable techniques that improve efficiencies by closely monitoring all aspects of workflow and labor.
- A WFM strategy requires unique elements specific to the industry and organization’s goals, demographics, and requirements.
- There are a number of mass-marketed workforce solutions with several areas of impact and general support across a range of departments and tasks.
While you can find off-the-shelf products to organize your business and develop a workforce management strategy, a more effective solution is a customized program or integrations. Watkyn is a software development partner capable of delivering management solutions that align with your strategies, goals, and desired outcomes.
6 Aspects of Workforce Management Solutions To Use to Your Advantage
Effectively managing your workforce systems requires software that can handle both industry-specific and organizational needs. Some programs are stand-alone solutions, while others are integrations with a human resources management solution.
Although custom application development helps your company get the most from any software, you can still benefit from the tools within a management solution. At a minimum, the following functionalities of WFM solutions provide significant operational advantages.
1. Forecasting and Budgeting
With workforce forecasting, you can use the data based on past experiences, current activities, and future expectations to help identify or predict trends in your utilization rates. The insight can apply to generic operations or have a more specific focus on a particular team.
Forecasting future trends allows you to accurately determine budget guidelines for things like labor costs. Labor forecasting informs how you set a schedule based on an anticipated workload.
2. Scheduling and Time Management
One of the hardest areas to manage in the workforce is scheduling and tracking employee hours. Labor costs are a significant area of overhead, and it can be tough to keep expenses under control while maintaining productivity.
Forecasting helps you understand and predict your labor needs. In addition, this aspect of workforce management solutions lets you control task delegation as well as record and track employee hours. This gives you more control over the costs related to productivity and can better account for every moment of the workday.
Scheduling also helps your company handle leave and absences more efficiently. An effective solution will have all the documentation available regarding time-off policies and requests, as well as allowing employees to submit and track leave requests. Managers can approve and track requests while remaining informed on when they need additional labor to fill a gap.
3. Data Reporting and Analytics
A workforce management solution is a treasure trove of data that will reveal the effectiveness and efficiency of your workforce. The program collects data points concerning onboarding processes, training, and employee proficiencies.
Real-time adherence is a metric providing a comparison between what your employees are actually doing and what they should be accomplishing. As an evaluation tool, this insight can improve the accuracy of employees and show the correlation between profit and time usage.
The reporting features and analytics provided by management solutions help with cost-cutting and smarter decision-making. Analyzing metrics gives you a way to check the effectiveness of your labor allowance and find areas needing improvement.
4. Recruitment
Workforce management solutions change the game of acquiring talent. Your recruiting team can better track applicants and candidates throughout the recruiting, application, and hiring processes. Based on the data already gathered, human resources can determine which areas need help and which candidates will make the best fit for the area.
Key features of recruiting management include:
- Central tracking system for applicants
- Verification of credentials
- Onboarding and training record-keeping
By having a better grasp on recruiting and tracking applicants with data analytics, you increase your competitive advantage over other companies looking for the same talent.
5. Compliance and Risk Mitigation
Mitigating risks is important to your company’s financial and reputational success. By removing or minimizing the threats that come from company-specific or industry risks, you give your business a chance to thrive and avoid legal trouble.
Workforce management solutions exchange error-prone systems like manual timeclocks, spreadsheets, and paper time sheets for automated timekeeping. Digital time tracking increases organizational profitability and improves the efficiency of your HR and payroll departments. It also mitigates risks with older labor-management practices.
Tracking employees’ eligibility for overtime or benefits is just one part of working to maintain compliance with local, state, and federal workplace regulations. Management software provides the big-picture view businesses need to identify potential risks and solutions to mitigate them.
6. Payroll and Benefits
Digitizing the scheduling and implementing a digital timekeeping solution improves the payroll experience for everyone. Employees enjoy the benefit of more reliable payments, as the software provides accurate records and processing for hours worked, overtime eligibility, and time off.
The system can eliminate many manual tasks often completed by HR departments, freeing up time for more important responsibilities. It also helps oversee benefit administration and maintain data needed for tax filing. Furthermore, fewer errors, more time, and more accuracy improve morale and productivity.
Available OTS Workforce Management Solutions
A quick internet search for workforce management software will turn up hundreds of results. These solutions address a wide range of organizational needs and can range from budget-friendly to extremely expensive. You can purchase a standalone product or integrate a particular platform with an HR suite already in place.
Before choosing a management solution, be sure to define your software needs in light of your anticipated business outcomes. From there, align the software’s capabilities with the process in place with your environment and budget. This can quickly narrow down which workforce management solutions will be effective for your organization.
Opting for Custom Workforce Management Solutions
While you could spend the time and money to try to make an OTS management solution work for your business, there is a great deal more potential in custom workforce management solutions. Watkyn is a software partner specializing in custom integrations, Quickbase app development, and RAD software solution. Contact our team to find out if a customer workforce program is ideal for your company’s needs.
