Balancing Labor Operations with Employee Engagement: A Comprehensive Guide to WFM Software

March 26, 2024

by Matt Cromar

Revolutionize Labor Operations And Employee Engagement Blog Thumbnail

Workforce management software provides several key capabilities to help companies better balance labor operations with employee happiness.

Legion Workforce Management Software (WFM) enables intelligent automation to directly boost workforce satisfaction. It streamlines staffing, predicts customer traffic for schedule planning, and controls labor costs.

No more guessing games for retailers—just strategic moves backed by data to put the right people in place at peak times. And engagement skyrockets when staff can manage their schedules and get recognized for their hard work.

The stakes are high, but the solution is clear: adopting comprehensive WFM software like Legion’s helps ensure you can meet business goals and employee needs simultaneously.

Doing so will pave the way toward sustainable growth through better-engaged teams who feel valued every time they clock in.

Key Takeaways

  • To run efficient business operations, companies need to be able to predict staffing needs more accurately than ever before while crafting schedules that respect individual employee preferences.
  • Accurate demand forecasts, optimized schedules, better tools for communication, precise methods to track and measure performance, and financial well-being features are all ways that workforce management software can support business needs.
  • Legion WFM software acknowledges the interconnected nature of business efficiency and workforce happiness, offering a comprehensive solution for sustained growth in retail businesses.

Using Workforce Management to Boost Your Labor Operations

With the growth in online sales and omnichannel operations such as in-store pickup or delivery impacting demand, today’s retailers must respond dynamically to varying demand levels. Workforce management software has become the key to helping businesses adapt to rapid market changes. With core functions like demand forecasting, scheduling, time tracking, and compliance management, these systems make operational excellence possible.

Easier and More Accurate Demand Forecasting

The first step toward operational excellence is predicting customer traffic precisely. Legion’s Demand Forecasting capabilities use AI to analyze in-store traffic data, point-of-sale system data, click-and-collect orders, weather events, and item-level historical sales data to ensure staffing levels match demand. With high-quality, data-driven modeling that provides highly accurate granular forecasts that continuously improve, you won’t be caught off guard during peak hours or waste resources during slow periods.

Optimized Scheduling

An optimized schedule keeps staff engaged and reduces turnover. Legion WFM enables intelligent automation to solve complex scheduling problems so managers can focus on being out on the floor interacting with staff and customers instead of in the back room dealing with daily scheduling changes.

Retailers often face unpredictable surges in customer flow, but Legion WFM makes it easier for managers to adapt schedules. Legion WFM enables managers to instantly create optimal schedules that match business needs with employee preferences and skills 96% of the time. This scheduling precision creates a smooth customer shopping experience and a less chaotic work environment for employees.

Legion Automated Scheduling considers employee preferences and qualifications while aligning with labor laws—balancing what’s best for your team and your bottom line. This can reduce the time managers spend creating and managing schedules s by up to 50%.

Simplified Communication

In today’s digital era, it’s necessary to have one place to easily communicate with your employees.

WFM software breaks down silos between management and staff members. You can share important messages directly to employees’ smartphones through Legion’s highly-rated mobile app. Legion provides schedule-aware communications capabilities that allow managers to communicate with their teams while ensuring that communications comply with labor laws. Team members can easily communicate with each other, and essential company communications can be funneled throughout the organization with a companywide news feed. With Legion Frontline Communications, companies can ensure that only employees on the clock access appropriate content.

Whether posting updates about shifts, specific location closings, or policy changes, you can eliminate confusion and save your managers valuable time with a communications solution that is built into Legion WFM software.

Satisfying Employees Leads to Customer Satisfaction

A satisfied workforce naturally leads to better service quality, as happy employees tend to go above and beyond in serving customers.

Studies show a direct link between employee satisfaction, customer happiness, and revenue growth; this begins with respecting employees’ time through sensible scheduling practices provided by workforce management solutions like Legion.

Legion’s mobile app, rated 4.8 in the app store, empowers employees to set their availability, stay on top of scheduling updates and open shift offers, communicate with their manager and the rest of the team, track their performance, and access their wages as they are earned.

Control Labor Costs

While you’re keeping employees happy, Legion’s WFM platform sets your business up for better financial health.

Legion Strategic Insights provides rich, pre-built dashboards with schedule, cost, compliance, productivity, and engagement metrics and gives managers instant access to the key metrics that drive operational improvements in their locations. With dashboards that update in real-time, managers can quickly change staffing levels, shift offers, and budget plans.

It’s much more manageable to control costs with the help of advanced analytics from Legion’s platform. Insights like these help retail businesses thrive. You can make more strategic decisions based on clear financial metrics without compromising service standards or employee well-being.

Strategies for Maximizing Employee Engagement Through WFM

Operations teams don’t have to prioritize budgets over the happiness of employees.

By automating tasks like leave requests and shift swaps through Legion’s user-friendly interface, you can control labor costs while giving workers more autonomy. This approach respects workers’ time, promotes work-life balance, and can lead to increased job satisfaction.

Flexible Schedules

With Legion WFM, schedules are no longer “one-size-fits-all”. Employees have the power to set their availability and swap shifts without hassle. Managers get insight into employee behavior, such as shift offer acceptance, to help them make more informed decisions about shift assignments. Schedule Score helps managers assess schedule quality and meet the factors most important to the business.

Legion’s Automated Scheduling enables intelligent automation to create optimal schedules that match business needs with employee preferences and skills 96% of the time. Legion considers personal preferences and skills-matching when creating schedules, ensuring everyone gets a fair chance at their preferred hours.

Rewards and Recognition Programs

A little recognition goes a long way in keeping teams motivated. By integrating rewards programs directly within its platform, Legion makes celebrating wins, big or small, an everyday occurrence.

Legion provides managers with an objective, easy-to-access daily breakdown of employee performance based on the metrics collected within Legion and those from external systems such as point of sale, inventory management, and in-store traffic counters. Companies can configure and track the metrics important to their operations and use Legion to manage existing programs like attendance policies and reward programs.

Whether hitting sales targets or simply going above and beyond, managers can now give employees the acknowledgment they deserve. Employees also get objective evaluations based on their ongoing performance.

Flexible Payment Options

Every employee’s financial situation differs; sometimes, waiting two weeks for a payday doesn’t cut it.

Flexibility in payment is key—something Legion understands and has implemented into its software. Legion tracks approved timesheets and makes those wages available to employees as they are earned. With a few simple clicks in Legion, employees can transfer their wages to their existing bank account to better manage their financial well-being.

Legion InstantPay allows access to earned wages ahead of schedule. Flexible payment options foster financial wellness among staff members, translating into happier, more engaged employees who stick around longer.

Employee Autonomy Over Availability Setting

The days when managers dictated schedules are fading away, and employee autonomy is becoming more critical than ever.

Team members can access and update their availability for all their work locations, while managers can set rules on how availability changes are approved. Transparency in the scheduling process leads to better understanding within the organization.

Self-scheduling capabilities let team members take control when they work, empowering them while meeting operational demands efficiently because happy workers mean better overall service and productivity.

Polls and Surveys Can Help Measure Engagement

Frontline Communications also includes features that let you send out polls and surveys to your employees.

Employees can answer your questions through the Legion mobile app, which provides insight into staff morale and engagement. By making it as easy as possible for employees to use, they’re more likely to give their feedback.

By listening to teams and gathering their feedback, companies can better adapt to changing workforce needs. According to Legion’s Annual State of the Hourly Workforce Survey, 22% of hourly workers look for jobs with tools that make communicating with their managers and teams easier.

Legion WFM Trusted By Businesses. Loved by Their Frontline Employees

With features designed to streamline processes and engage employees, Legion Workforce Management Software stands out as a powerful ally in today’s competitive landscape.

The heart of efficient workforce management lies in predicting needs before they become urgent. Legion WFM leverages AI-powered analytics, giving you foresight into staffing requirements with precise accuracy.

Advanced algorithms analyze sales data, foot traffic, and other variables so you can plan better for busy periods and save costs during slower times.

Beyond the data, our scheduling capabilities help you show your staff that their work-life balance matters. Optimized scheduling considers business needs, employee preferences, and fair labor practices to create one seamless solution.

By centralizing communications within its platform, Legion ensures that every team member is informed about schedule changes or company updates through their mobile devices.

The right WFM software understands that an efficient business operation goes hand-in-hand with a happy workforce. They aren’t mutually exclusive, and neither is more important than the other.

Legion WFM has been carefully designed with precisely these factors in mind. To learn more, schedule your demo today.