Effective Rostering allows a Manager to respond to the unpredictable nature of customer demand and impacts profitability more directly and immediately than any other aspect of operations.
Labour Cost is one of the two most expensive manageable costs in your Restaurant and Café, but the only one that can be managed in real-time, in response to daily fluctuations in revenue.
The impact of getting a Roster wrong is considerable; too many staff and the cost of sales increases, productivity drops, and service decreases. Too few staff result in poor customer service, lost sales, and frustrated, overworked staff.
Effective Rostering is the single most proactive means of achieving sustainable profitability and can both elevate a business above the 37 percent of Food and Beverage businesses that lost money in 2017/18, and continue to trade when one in five close every year.
What does a Roster Do?
A roster details when and in what role employees will work in the one to two weeks ahead, and performs four key roles.
1. controls labour costs
2. meets customer demand
3. manages staff availability
4. meets government regulations and contractual obligations
Controlling costs through effective rostering is a challenge; no two employees have the same skills, productivity, availability or desire to work the same number of hours, and customer demand fluctuates significantly across both the week, and seasonally throughout the year.
How do we measure the performance of a Roster?
A Rosters performance is measured through what is called Labour Cost, or Wage Cost percentage. This is calculated by adding up the wage cost (the dollar value) of all the staff rostered that week (including salaried staff and any staff that are on Annual Leave) and dividing it by the revenue generated that week.
When we write a roster, we calculate the value of that roster (including super contributions and Workers Compensations fees) and divide it by the anticipated revenue that will occur over that period. We then compare this roster to the actual week’s events; the revenue that was achieved, and the cost of the staff in servicing that revenue.
A high performing roster does two things; the roster’s labour costs are close to the costs of the actual trading weeks labour cost (as a percentage of revenue), and secondly close to or at the pre-defined labour cost target that has been determined to be ideal for the business to be profitable.
Steve is new to Management; he Manages a 100-seat Fine Dining Restaurant in Sydney. He has 23 staff on his roster and writes his rosters two weeks in advance.
Steve uses the typical Industry approach of assuming that next week’s revenue will achieve the same revenue as the corresponding week last year; the week starting August 13th 2018 earned $36,000, so he assumes that the week starting August 12th 2019 will do the same.
He uses an excel spreadsheet to write the rosters, and to roughly calculate the wage cost of that roster and estimates his roster costs $14,000, give or take. Steve didn’t really worry about the cost of his roster; he rostered by how many staff he needed on every shift, which is the same as every week, and it usually took care of itself.
The wage cost of last week’s payroll was 36% (including addons), and Steve assumes that trade will pick up and be higher than the $36,000 he noted from last year, as it was the week before. But trade didn’t pick up. Revenue actually dropped, and the 38.9 percent roster became a 47 percent payroll. Steve also hadn’t accounted for Super contributions and Workers compensation in his roster, underestimating what the true roster cost would be.
As a result, the business lost $3,480 in just one week, and the roster and the Manager, Steve were largely to blame. He had miscalculated the roster; it actually came in at $15,000, and Revenue had dropped to $32,000.
Had he maintained a roster cost and then the payroll at the previous weeks wage cost of 36% he would have adjusted his roster to be $11,520 in value. Steve has a meeting with the owner next week to explain what happened.
What is Labour Cost Percentage?
It is the total cost of staffing your venue. It must include Superannuation and Workers compensation costs. It should also include accrued entitlements, such as annual leave.
The Labour Cost percentage = Payroll Cost (cost of all labour across the trading week including Super contributions and Workers Compensation fees) divided by Revenue earned in that week (less GST).
Labour Cost = $15,000 /$32,000
= 47%
The Roster Cost = Roster Cost (cost of all rostered staff plus Super contributions and Workers Compensation fees) divided by the anticipated revenue to be earned in the corresponding period.
Roster cost = $14,000 /$36,000
= 38.9%
What went wrong?
When we write a roster, it becomes a mostly fixed cost in anticipation of an uncertain revenue; we simply don’t know how much money we will take each day, each service or from each guest.
On average Managers spend 4 percent more on rosters than they should; Managers and Owners often under-estimate the amount of revenue in the week they write the roster for and spend more labour cost than they should to meet that increased demand.
A 4 percent saving in Labour cost is a significant increase in profit; for a typical Restaurant it would mean a 110 percent increase, a Café a 120 percent increase.
But Steve made a larger error, common to Managers and Owners that use spreadsheets instead of Rostering Technology.
Steve didn’t accurately cost his roster and didn’t accurately forecast his revenue. He forgot to plan for tasks that can be controlled, such as receiving a beverage order.
And finally, Steve didn’t react to changes in revenue; the roster he had written in advance was different to the one he would have written in hindsight.
He hadn’t controlled the labour cost, nor met the customer demand; fewer customers dined in his Restaurant, and his Labour cost blew out, resulting in thousands of dollars lost, in just a week.
Effective Rostering is quite simply the cornerstone to sustainable profitability. And conversely, ineffective rostering can undermine profitability more rapidly than any other aspect of operations.
A beautiful fit-out, and perfect food are for nothing if a roster sends a business broke.
The Role of Scheduling in Labour Cost Management
Effective Rostering for Profit involves Four stages;
1. Forecast Customer Demand.
Forecasting demand is a cornerstone of profitable rostering. Whilst a forecast is little more than an informed guess, it is much more effective than rostering without a forecast.
Forecasting involves two stages; firstly, reflecting upon what happened 12 months ago in the corresponding week last year. Was there something different about that week? A local event that drew customers away, poor weather, a public holiday, Easter or other special event? Was that week last year significantly different from the 4 weeks before it?
Secondly, we assess the last 19 weeks of trade for the business; what is the average Revenue over the last 19 weeks, per day? That is what is the average Monday trade, the average Tuesday etc?
We take the average of the last 19 weeks Revenue, per day, consider if any adjustment is necessary due to special events or the weather, and write a roster to a predetermined Labour Cost target.
For example, Steve now has a labour cost target of 34% (including addons). The average of the last 19 weeks revenue is $31,500. The Labour Cost target for his roster is;
Roster Cost Target = Average 19 weeks revenue multiplied by the Labour Cost target
Roster Cost Target = $31,500 x by 34 percent = $10,710
2. Determine Staff Availability
Define availability for staff; what days can and cannot be worked, are any staff unavailable over the rostering horizon, do staff have limitations as to the number of hours they can work, will salaried staff be rostered to work over-time, and understand regulations such as minimum duration required between two shifts.
A good Rostering Software package like Roubler will manage this on your behalf and provide feedback if you attempt to roster a staff member beyond their availability.
3. Schedule Staff on the Roster
Roster Staff to a total cost no more than the target Labour cost percentage value.
A great Rostering Software will include all of the addons, such as Super contributions etc, automatically cost in Public Holidays, and penalty rates over the Rostering horizon, has automatic award recognition for new staff, and staff with differing experience levels and determines an exact calculation of the Roster
Great rostering software tags specific staff with qualifications, and experience. For example only staff members with experience as a Barista can be rostered as a Barista.
4. Adjust the Roster to Real-Time information.
A Roster revolves around an assumed customer demand, which is unpredictable. If the predicted daily revenue is not achieved, the roster must be revised.
For example, Steve’s average Monday revenue is $3,500. He has 4 Front of House staff, and 2 chefs rostered, and a roster value of $1,400.
Tuesday morning Steve realises that Monday’s revenue was only $2,500, though the wage cost was $1,375.
The weeks revenue, even if the balance of the weeks predicted revenue is correct, will be $1000 lower than the revenue the roster was written to.
Based upon the predicted $31,500 weekly Revenue, Steve had $10,710 to spend on his roster to achieve a 34 percent Labour Cost. With the loss of $1,000 Revenue on Monday, Steve now has a Roster cost of $10,370 for the whole week. He needs to find $315 savings from the next six days.
The best rostering software has automatic award recognition for new staff, and staff with differing experience, and a payroll function, which allows a manager to know exactly the cost of completed shifts, allowing the facilitation of adjustments in the roster across the balance of the week.
24 Hints to Managing a Roster Profitably
Labour Cost percentage Targets?
Just what is considered a good Labour cost percentage for a restaurant and café? The answer depends on the strategy employed by the business, and the segment it is in.
Steve Manages a Fine Dining Restaurant; it is licensed, and it is a table-service restaurant, and formal. Across its total menu, the restaurant has a food cost of 20 percent, and the wine list enjoys a mark-up of 220 percent. Table turns are slow, average spend is high, and the total business wage cost is over 30 percent. This is deceptive, because the kitchen wage cost is over 40 percent, which forces the Front of House Wage Cost to be less than 30 percent.
Carmel’s Café is a Quick Service Café, where orders are taken at the counter, and menu items, like their enormous muffins, are bought in already made. Carmel’s Food Cost is higher, but she doesn’t have any kitchen staff, and the service required is much lower than in Steve’s Restaurant. Carmel’s target labour cost is 25 percent.
Neither Food Business is wrong; they are pursuing the ideal Wage Cost Percentage for their specific business in their specific segment of the industry.
Conclusion
Rostering is a fundamental role for a Manager or Business Owner, and its complexity and impact on the business not only justifies but demands sophisticated Rostering Software with integrated payroll and automatic award recognition.
Rostering software that costs a business $100 per month requires a labour saving of only four hours to make the software cost neutral. But using a powerful Rostering solution like Roubler provides an opportunity to not only save time, and save money, but to actually provide the business with a tool that improves the profitability of the Restaurant or Café beyond its cost.
The business can make more money when partnering with Rouble than not. And no Restaurant or Café can ignore that.
Ivan Brewer