Staff scheduling: how to optimize the organization of your production teams?

Introduction

Did you know that a production manager can spend up to 35% of his or her time managing schedules and reorganizing teams in the face of unforeseen events? A revealing statistic shared by many industrial sites.

In workshops and factories, shift planning is not just a question of organization - it's a decisive factor in performance. Every misallocation can lead to production delays, quality defects and even safety incidents. Every hour spent juggling Excel spreadsheets is an hour lost to process improvement.

The reality in the field speaks for itself: when an operator is absent, when an urgent order arrives, when a clearance expires... the whole organization has to be rethought, often in a hurry and with fragmented information.

While industrial production has undergone considerable modernization in recent decades, shift planning methods have remained surprisingly traditional in many companies. Excel spreadsheets with complex formulas, paper-based displays that are difficult to update, information scattered across several departments... all of these are obstacles to responsiveness and agility.

1. What is personnel scheduling in an industrial environment?

Definition and issues specific to the industrial sector

Coordinating the work of production operators requires a precise vision of skills, needs and daily constraints. When a team leader allocates his staff to shifts, he's not just assigning schedules - he's dealing with technical skills, levels of expertise and production contingencies. This work, often time-consuming for managers, has a direct impact on the plant's ability to meet deadlines and maintain quality, even when absences or urgent orders arise.

In industry, this planning takes on special characteristics:

• Specific technical skills that are often non-interchangeable
• Production requirements linked to strict customer commitments
• Safety constraints and regulatory compliance (authorizations, certifications)
• Organization in successive teams (2×8, 3×8, 5×8)
• Fluctuations in activity, sometimes seasonal or linked to orders

Site and production managers know that poor planning can lead to line stoppages, delivery delays, and even quality and safety problems.

The different components of effective planning

Truly effective planning in an industrial environment integrates several dimensions:

• The human dimension availability of operators, skills mastered, medical restrictions, personal wishes, work/life balance
• The technical dimension available equipment, preventive maintenance, skills required for each position
• The regulatory dimension : legal working hours, compulsory breaks, up-to-date authorizations
• The economic dimension optimize resources, limit non-essential overtime, anticipate temporary staffing needs

Integrating these multiple parameters makes for a complex task, all the more so when the tools used are not adapted to the realities of the industrial field.

Impact on productivity and team satisfaction

Optimizing schedules has a direct impact on two fundamental aspects of industrial performance:

On productivity A well-designed schedule allows you to :

• Reduce production downtime
• Ensuring the right skills at the right time
• Limiting overcapacity and undercapacity
• Anticipating training and recruitment needs

The experience of industrial sites that have optimized their planning shows substantial gains. For example, LVMH Fragrance Brands has been able to minimize assignment errors thanks to constraints set when configuring its tool, thus avoiding line stoppages linked to unanticipated absences (See LVMH Fragrance Brands Use Case)

On employee satisfaction Clear and fair planning helps to :

• Making the most of everyone's skills
• Greater transparency in allocation decisions
• Reduce the stress of last-minute changes
• Facilitating work/life balance

Feedback from sites such as Berry Global or TriganoThe clarification of planning processes has had a direct impact on the working atmosphere and team commitment.

2. The daily challenges of production planning

Managing absenteeism and unforeseen events

Absenteeism is a major headache for any production manager. Whether it's sick leave, late arrivals or last-minute absences, you need to be able to respond quickly without compromising production.

The challenge is twofold:

• Quickly identify potential replacements with the required skills
• Reorganize teams without overloading certain operators or creating imbalances

As the experience of many production sites illustrates, responsiveness to the unexpected depends directly on visibility of available skills. Without a suitable system, the time spent looking for emergency solutions multiplies.

Balancing production needs and available skills

Versatility is not always present in industrial teams, making it difficult to match production needs with available resources. Several factors come into play:

• Specific skills sometimes held by a limited number of operators
• Positions requiring special clearance (working at heights, electrical work, etc.)
• Know-how not always formally passed on

Visit Exxelia case speaks for itself: the company had to set up a rigorous skills monitoring system to identify critical know-how and anticipate retirements that risked depriving the company of essential skills.

Compliance with legal and regulatory constraints

Planning in the industry requires a strict legal framework:

• Respect for daily and weekly rest periods
• Managing mandatory breaks
• Maximum working hours
• Compliance with company and collective agreements
• Validity of necessary authorizations and certifications

These constraints, far from being mere administrative formalities, guarantee the safety and well-being of our teams. Ignoring them not only exposes the company to legal risks, but also to incidents and accidents.

The limits of traditional methods (Excel, paper tables)

The tools historically used for planning quickly show their limits in the face of industrial complexity:

• Lack of visibility A difficult task: getting an overview of skills and availability
• Update problems information quickly becomes obsolete
• Risk of error complex Excel formulas, data entry errors, oversights
• Lost time according to feedback, 35 hours a week can be spent managing staff schedules in some companies.
• Lack of collaboration files often accessible to only one person at a time
• No alert no automatic notification in case of anomaly (hours exceeded, authorization expired)

As the SEB Group has found, using Excel for scheduling can generate up to 35 different files for a single site, making consistency and updating virtually impossible.

3. How to set up an efficient staff scheduling system?

Preliminary analysis of needs and constraints

Before implementing a new planning system, an analysis phase is essential:

• Map current processes How are schedules managed today? What are the sticking points?
• Identify business cycles Are there predictable periods of high and low intensity?
• Identify specific constraints night shifts, critical positions, rare skills...
• Assessing available resources How many people currently manage schedules? How much time do they spend on it?

This step allows you to avoid reproducing existing problems and to adapt the solution to your site's specific needs.

Integration of skills and authorizations

The heart of effective planning lies in precise knowledge of the skills available. This means :

• Creating a skills repository structured by item
• Define mastery levels for each skill (beginner, intermediate, expert)
• Identify regulatory authorizations and their expiry dates
• Identify in-house trainers able to pass on every skill

Valrhona's experience perfectly illustrates this need: faced with growth of 15% and an employee turnover rate of 20%, the company had to formalize precise skills monitoring to maintain its production capacity without compromising quality.

Anticipating peaks in activity

Proactive planning is a key success factor:

• Analyze historical data to identify load patterns
• Prepare scenarios for busy periods
• Anticipating staffing needs additional (tempsCDD)
• Schedule training courses during off-peak periods

This anticipation considerably reduces team stress and optimizes costs linked to the use of overtime or emergency temporary staff.

4. The benefits of a digital solution for your schedules

Time-saving for managers

Digitizing schedules frees up considerable time for management teams. Take the case of a workshop manager who used to spend almost 10 hours a week juggling Excel files and communicating changes. With a suitable toolThis same task can be reduced to less than 2 hours, enabling this time to be redirected towards supporting teams and improving processes.

Automation features play a key role here: duplication of standard weeks, skill-based assignment suggestions, automatic alerts in the event of non-compliance with rest rules - all of which make life easier for managers.

Better visibility for all employees

"When do I work next week?" This recurring question finds an immediate answer with digital tools. Operators can consult their schedules from their smartphones or on screens in the workshops, receiving notifications of any changes.

This transparency not only improves their personal organization, but also fosters commitment. An operator who can view his schedule several weeks in advance will be better able to organize his personal life, and will be less likely to generate unplanned absenteeism.

Reduced assignment errors

Assignment errors can have serious consequences in industry: safety risks if an operator doesn't have the required clearance, quality problems if skills are insufficient, or even failure to respect statutory rest periods.

Digital solutions integrate automatic controls that immediately alert you to any anomalies: expired authorizations, exceeding authorized working hours, or missing skills for a position. These safeguards prevent potentially costly errors, both in human and financial terms.

Adaptability to the unexpected

When faced with a last-minute absentee or urgent order, digital tools offer unrivalled responsiveness. In just a few clicks, they can identify potential replacements according to their skills and availability, simulate different organizational scenarios, and immediately inform the people concerned of any changes.

This agility translates into a reduction in unplanned downtime and improved service continuity, both key factors in industrial performance.

Centralized information

One of the major advantages of digital solutions lies in the centralization of data: no more scattered files between HR, production and quality departments. Updated information is accessible to all authorized users, ensuring consistency and reliability.

This centralization also facilitates interaction between departments, as one electronics manufacturing site found out after digitizing its staff scheduling management: "Before, when maintenance planned an intervention, production wasn't always informed in time. Today, everyone works on the same platform.

5. Concrete examples of successful transformation

Case studies and feedback

There is no shortage of successful transformations in the industry. Let's take a few outstanding examples:

LVMH Fragrance Brands has completely rethought the way it manages staff schedules at its Beauvais site. Previously, schedules were managed in Excel, using physical maps to position operators. Today, the company uses a system that automates the assignment of personnel according to skills. The results are striking: 25% of time saved on managing assignment schedules thanks to automation. (Use case LVMH Fragrance Brands x Mercateam)

Groupe SEB eliminated 35 different Excel files used to manage staff schedules by switching to a digital solution. Beyond the obvious simplification, this transformation has harmonized processes between sites and fully digitized 5 previously manual processes. (Use case Groupe SEB x Mercateam)

Triganoa manufacturer of leisure vehicles, has succeeded in helping its operators become more versatile thanks to digitalization. The site can now clearly visualize available and missing skills, and organize targeted training to develop versatility in critical positions.

These examples show that the digitization of scheduling is more than just a change of tool - it profoundly transforms working methods and unlocks considerable potential for improvement. (Trigano x Mercateam use case)

Quantifiable results

The benefits of these transformations can be measured in concrete terms:

• Time saving Shiseido: Shiseido has seen a saving of 4 hours a week for department managers after digitizing their schedules.
• Increased versatility Valrhona was able to increase its team versatility rate by 34% by precisely identifying training needs.
• Reduce planning time SEW Usocome has reduced the time spent managing staff schedules by 30%.
• Deleting paper documents Berry Global has eliminated over 450 paper training books by going digital.

These quantifiable gains are often accompanied by equally important qualitative improvements: a better working atmosphere, reduced tension linked to last-minute changes, and greater appreciation of employees' skills.

6. How do you choose the right solution for your needs?

Essential criteria to consider

Several criteria should guide your choice of a staff scheduling solution:

Ease of use : choose an intuitive interface (Discover the Mercateam platform), accessible to non-technical users. Managers and team leaders need to be able to get to grips with the tool quickly, in order to reap its full benefits.

Flexibility Your site has its own specificities (team organization, working hours, particular skills). The solution must adapt to your processes, not the other way round.

Accessibility Access options: according to your needs, evaluate the different access options (fixed computers, screens, tablets in the workshops, mobile application for employees).

Interoperability The solution must be able to communicate with your existing systems (HRIS, ERP, time management tools).

Regulatory compliance Make sure the tool incorporates the specific rules of your collective bargaining agreement and your company agreement.

Questions to ask before choosing

To narrow down your choice, ask yourself these essential questions:

1. What are our main current sticking points when it comes to managing staff schedules?
2. Which departments and users need access to the solution?
3. Do we need detailed management of skills and authorizations?
4. What is our internal capacity to manage the transition to digital?
5. What are our specific constraints (shift work, multi-site teams, etc.)?
6. How do we want employees to interact with the tool?

The answers will naturally point to the solutions best suited to your context.

Conclusion

Managing staff schedules remains a daily challenge for any industrial company. Between production requirements, specific skills and unforeseen events, team leaders juggle numerous constraints - often with tools ill-suited to the complexity of their environment.

Digitizing this key process is not simply a change of tool, but a real transformation that affects the organization of work, the development of skills and the quality of life of teams.

So, are you ready to transform your staff scheduling into a real performance driver?