The pandemic changed a lot of the fundamental ways in which we work. What was initially driven by safety quickly highlighted just how much better our workforce management tools could be. Workforce management is the process whereby a business or institution maximises competency and efficiency. Employee salaries take up to 70% of businesses operating overheads. Owners need to use the rest of their resources efficiently. Workforce management is a must-have solution on that front.
Reputable workforce management tools accomplish three big things for businesses – increase engagement, improve efficiency, and ensure compliance. These tools can help offset uncertainty around planning. Think of it as the bridge that closes the gap between where your workforce can go and where it stands currently. What workforce management tools would your business benefit from implementing?
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Flexible Meetings
It could have been an email is an endless refrain for employees fed up with meeting after meeting. What are you going to do about it? The key is to make meetings more flexible. With more home-working and workers in different offices, tools like Zoom have become invaluable. Zoom provides real-time captioning, and with additional tools, like Otter, Rev or Headroom, you can share notes. The latter will email all participants a video playback, a graph highlighting who spoke and for how long, shared notes, and a searchable transcript.
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Mind Mapping
The line separating creativity and productivity tools has never been thinner. Mind mapping with tools like Roam and Obsidian adapt to your needs. You can use one tool to map your goals and another to catalogue them, essentially using one productivity tool to serve as your heart and another to serve as your brain. Their purpose is to force you to define your priorities right off the bat. A business owner can create a company mind map, and the employees can create theirs for their specific role based on the company’s values and goals. It ensures everyone is singing from the correct hymn sheet and working towards the same goal, even though they may have different roles to fulfil.
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Clocking in Kiosks
COVID-19 has changed the way we do a lot of things, including timekeeping. Business owners want to provide employees with a safe working environment, and there are different ways to do that. Historically, everyone clocks in at the same point. That isn’t just a risk for virus spread; it’s also not the most efficient way for people to sign in. Not only does it encourage people to sign in early or late as they queue up to start, but it also costs you time and energy to review exception reports.
A digital clocking in kiosk reduces the time clocking-in takes and provides you with a simpler paperless system to work with. Or, you can use a mobile app. Your employees don’t need to queue up, they can get straight to work as soon as it’s time, and you can use geofencing to prevent false sign-ins. It’s also ideal for managing off-site employees, whether they work from home or in the field.
The right workforce management tools deliver an experience to enhance employee job satisfaction. With these tools, you can automate HR tasks to improve roster creation, predict demand and check attendance. You can engage your team anywhere, anytime and from any device. It also mitigates risk and ensures you remain compliant with the complex labour regulations.
