How to Schedule Employee Retail Hours

Retail store managers are responsible for a variety of tasks. They generally have to oversee the store books, order supplies and manage store employees. Putting together employee schedules is a major task. If not enough employees are scheduled to work, the manager could end up with some dissatisfied customers. On the other hand, if too many employees are scheduled, the store could lose money.

Things You'll Need

• Store statistics from previous year
• Schedule

Instructions

1. Create employee work schedules two weeks to a month in advance. This will ensure that employees have plenty of time to see their schedule. It will also increase the chances of employees giving advanced notice if they are unable to work particular hours.

2. Look back over the previous year's statistics to see how busy the store was at the same time last year. These figures are good indicators of how much business your store will do this year and will help you decide how many people you should schedule for a particular shift. For example, if your store typically requires 12 cashiers, 5 floor people, 2 customer service representatives and 2 managers at the busiest time, schedule these people for the busiest projected time based on the previous year's numbers.

3. Determine the busiest times during your store's operating hours. Different retail stores have different times of business. If your store is slow in the morning, schedule just enough people to keep it running. Have a second shift come in just before a rush and stay just beyond the rush and a third shift come for the evening and store closing. Overlap shifts to offer relief during the busiest times of the day, allow for employee breaks and accommodate for employees being late.

4. Utilize on-call employees to help fill in shift gaps. If Saturdays are sometimes extremely busy and sometimes average, have a couple employees on call to help out if needed. Have their on-call shift scheduled for the busiest part of the day, and inform them that they will be given an hour's notice to come in. On-call employees are also useful if someone calls in sick.