BUS606: Operations and Supply Chain Management

Staffing guidelines are helpful for the task of staffing with just enough labor. However, the most exact method of staffing involves direct labor time analysis. Management generally is careful to hire only a basic core full-time crew and add flexible-hour employees as needed.

A staffing guide tells the manager how many labor hours are needed for each position and shift to produce and serve a given number of meals in the given restaurant. It incorporates the productivity standards. It tells managers what number of labor hours are needed for the volume of business forecast for a given meal period. The labor hours can be converted into labor dollars to establish standard labor costs.

The staffing guide serves as a tool for planning work schedules and controlling labor costs. The labor hours in the guide can be converted into labor dollars and standard labor costs by multiplying the labor hours for each position by the wage scale for that position. The staffing guide should be based on the performance of good employees. When scheduling new employees who have not completed an orientation training period, allowances will have to be made for their lower productivity.

This form of staffing guide is much more useful than industry guidelines that do not take into account the specific factors which affect the productivity in your workplace. It may still be useful to compare your staffing guide to other properties in order to assess how competitive you are.

An example of a staffing guide is shown in Table 13.1. Note that the staffing guide shows the minimum number of staff per peak service period.

TABLE 13.1: STAFFING GUIDE

Guide shows minimum number of staff per peak service period.