Long-term schedule planning

Healthcare professionals fall into three general scheduling categories: fixed scheduled, partially fixed scheduled, and flexibly scheduled. Typically, full-time staffs in the organization work a relatively static, fixed schedule. Some full-time and part-time employees work a partially fixed schedule (in which only a portion of their schedule repeats regularly and the rest of the schedule is much more varying over different scheduling periods).

The Master Rotation (MR) feature is the ideal schedule planning mechanism for full-time staff in a healthcare organization. This feature supports the creation of long-term shift patterns, along with predefined costing metrics for each pattern. These patterns are then assigned to the employees and become the employee’s baseline work schedule upon publishing.

The One-time Schedule (OTS) feature supports the schedule planning phase for a healthcare employee who works a partially fixed schedule. Partially fixed schedules are set up with a schedule template. The schedule template is used to define the fixed part of the employees’ schedule. The template is used to generate the actual schedule for each scheduling period. The scheduling period contains the fixed part of the employee's schedule and provides the platform for defining the remainder of the employee’s non-fixed schedule. The schedule is then published for the scheduling period and becomes the employee’s work schedule. The next schedule period is created by repeating this process.

Template scheduling and self-scheduling let scheduling managers plan for the workload coverage required in their units, represented by the shifts and the quantities of shifts required. This planned workload is configured in a cyclical template, which can then be used for generating shifts. The generated shifts serve as input to self-scheduling processes, in which qualifying employees can participate.

Employees select these generated shifts from the templates to construct their own work schedule. As part of the shift selection process, scheduling managers can configure various rules to be enforced during the shift selection. These rules help to ensure that the resultant schedules are compliant with the rules and practices in the organization. Upon completion of shift selection by participating employees, scheduling managers review the selections, make any necessary changes, and publish the schedule.