You can configure Dayforce to use a labor curve when determining a zone’s staffing requirements in Schedules. When configured, it generates relative staffing needs throughout the day.
For example, the labor curve might dictate that you need twice the amount of staff between 5:00 PM and 7:00 PM than between 9:00 AM and 11:00 AM. The labor curve is either configured or derived from historical sales data, in which case the labor curve matches traffic levels derived from the number of transactions throughout the day.
For example, customer service might need 200 hours next Monday, and those 200 hours should cost $1,800. These figures are defined in the planning process, trickling down from your budget, to the forecast based on historical data, and your adjusted sales and non-service hours for the week.
The labor curve determines when those 200 hours are spent throughout the day. For example, you need only five hours between 9:00 AM and 10:00 AM, but 20 between 6:00 PM and 7:00 PM. This represents needing four times the number of employees during the busy evening rush than in the morning.
For zones that use the labor curve, Dayforce graphs your staffing requirements and levels, so you can compare your schedules to your location’s staffing needs:
For each quarter-hour increment during your location’s operating hours, Dayforce shows a color-coded bar. These bars form a graph of your staffing levels compared to the demand. The color of the bars describes the efficiency of the schedule at that time: green indicates your staffing level matches your need, yellow means you are understaffed, and red means you are overstaffed for that quarter hour.
The height of the bars corresponds to your staffing levels, requirements, and by how much your schedule is off from the requirements, depending if you are over- or understaffed.
- Understaffed: The height of just the green portion is your staffing level, while the height of the whole bar, both the green and yellow portion, is your staffing requirement. The yellow portion shows by how many staff you’re understaffed.
- Overstaffed: The height of just the green portion is your staffing requirements, while the height of the whole bar, both the green and red portion, is your staffing level. Just the red portion shows you by how much you are overstaffed.
- Ideally staffed: The height of the green bar is both your staffing level and requirement.
You can check the difference between your staffing levels and requirements for any quarter-hour of the schedule.
Hover the cursor over an under- or overstaffed time and Dayforce shows the difference between your schedule and your staffing need.
Note: If you add or edit location daily property values in the Location Daily Properties panel after you’ve generated your labor curve, you should use the Refresh Labor button to update the curve based on the edited patterns. See Location Daily Properties (Schedules only).