Restaurants have highly variable workloads, which makes it difficult to schedule the employees effectively. In this post, we're going to discuss the schedules for two positions (Hosts and Servers). Obviously, there are a lot more positions than these (e.g., bussers/food runners, line cooks, dishwashers, bartenders, managers, and so on), but this should be enough to illustrate the process. To simplify the examples, we will only use full-time employees.
 

The primary goal of any schedule is to match the coverage (the number of people working) with the workload. In other words, when you're busy, you want enough people at work so that customers get served quickly, and when you're not busy, you don't want a bunch of employees standing around with nothing to do. 

Hosts

The table below shows the coverage requirements for the Hosts. They are needed from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. or a total of 16 hours a day. They are busiest Saturday and Sunday mornings, and then again Friday and Saturday evenings. They need 2 Hosts during the busy periods and only 1 Host the rest of the time. The heavier workload lasts on Sunday until 4 p.m. It begins on Fridays at that same time.

 

Hosts - Coverage Requirements
Time Period	Fri	Sat	Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu
6am-4pm	1	2	2	1	1	1	1
4pm-10pm	2	2	1	1	1	1	1

 

 

 

Since the Hosts are needed for 16 hours a day, a simple solution would be to adopt two 8-hour shifts. Let's see what that might look like.

 

 

Hosts - Option #1

Host / Week

Fri

Sat

Sun

Mon

Tue

Wed

Thu

Hours

A / Week 1

-

d8

d8

d8

-

d8

d8

40

B / Week 2

d8

d8

d8

-

-

-

-

24

C / Week 3

e8

e8

e8

e8

e8

-

-

40

D / Week 4

e8

e8

-

-

d8

e8

e8

40

Average

36

Key:

d8 = 8-hour day shift (6am-2pm)

e8 = 8-hour evening shift (2pm-10pm)

Coverage:

Fri

Sat

Sun

Mon

Tue

Wed

Thu

6am to 2pm

1

2

2

1

1

1

1

2pm to 10pm

2

2

1

1

1

1

1

 

The way this schedule works is that the 4 Hosts (A, B, C, and D) start the schedule in the weeks shown for them. After finishing the initial week, they rotate to the next week of the schedule. Host A moves from Week 1 to Week 2, Host B moves from Week 2 to Week 3, Host C moves to Week 4, and Host D moves to Week 1.  They are all working the same 4-week pattern; it's just that they are all in different weeks.

 

The resulting coverage is also shown above. It's similar to the requirements, but changes at 2 p.m. instead of 4 p.m. To avoid this, we'll have to change the shift length. If we split the 16-hour day into a 10-hour shift from 6 a.m. to 4 p.m. and a 6-hour shift from 4 p.m. to 10 p.m. we can better match the coverage requirements. Here's what this would look like.

 

Hosts - Option #2

Host / Week

Fri

Sat

Sun

Mon

Tue

Wed

Thu

Hours

A / Week 1

-

D10

D10

-

-

D10

D10

40

B / Week 2

D10

D10

D10

D10

-

-

-

40

C / Week 3

e6

e6

e6

e6

e6

-

-

30

D / Week 4

e6

e6

-

-

D10

e6

e6

34

Average

36

Key:

D10 = 10-hour day shift (6am-4pm)

e6 = 6-hour evening shift (4pm-10pm)

Coverage:

Fri

Sat

Sun

Mon

Tue

Wed

Thu

6am to 4pm

1

2

2

1

1

1

1

4pm to 10pm

2

2

1

1

1

1

1

 

 

The schedule works the same way as Option #1. As you can see from the coverage, it is an exact match with the requirements. This approach requires the same number of employees and the same average weekly hours as Option #1. By changing the shift lengths, we were able to make more effective use of the staff.

 

 

Servers

The table below shows the coverage requirements for the Servers. They are also needed from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. or a total of 16 hours a day. This position is busiest during lunches and dinners, especially Friday and Saturday evenings. 

 

Servers - Coverage Requirements
Time Period			Fri	Sat	Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu
6am-12pm			1	2	2	1	1	1	1
12pm-2pm			2	2	2	2	2	2	2
2pm-6pm			2	2	2	1	1	1	1
6pm-10pm			3	3	2	2	2	2	2

 

A simple solution would be to split the day into two 8-hour shifts. Let's see what that might look like.

 

Servers - Option #1

Server / Week

Fri

Sat

Sun

Mon

Tue

Wed

Thu

Hours

A / Week 1

-

d8

d8

-

d8

d8

d8

40

B / Week 2

d8

d8

d8

d8

-

-

d8

40

C / Week 3

d8

-

-

d8

d8

d8

-

32

D / Week 4

e8

e8

e8

-

e8

e8

e8

48

E / Week 5

e8

e8

e8

e8

-

-

e8

40

F / Week 6

e8

e8

-

e8

e8

e8

-

40

Average

40

Key:

d8 = 8-hour day shift (6am-2pm)

e8 = 8-hour evening shift (2pm-10pm)

Coverage:

Fri

Sat

Sun

Mon

Tue

Wed

Thu

6am to 2pm

2

2

2

2

2

2

2

2pm to 10pm

3

3

2

2

2

2

2

 

 

This schedule has 6 Servers (A, B, C, D, E, and F). They start the schedule in the weeks shown for them. After finishing this initial week, they rotate to the next week of the schedule. Server A moves to Week 2, Server B moves to Week 3, and so on. Server F moves up to Week 1. They are all working the same 6-week pattern; it's just that they are all in different weeks.

 

The resulting coverage is shown above. Although dividing the day into two 8-hour shifts is simple, the coverage requirements are exceeded for most of the day. Only 1-person coverage is needed Mon-Fri from 6a-12p and again from 2p-6p, yet the schedule produces 2-person coverage during those periods. To avoid this, we could split the 16-hour day into four different shift lengths that overlap the busier meal times. Here's what this would look like.

 

Servers - Option #2
Server / Week		Fri		Sat		Sun		Mon		Tue		Wed		Thu		Hours
A / Week 1		-		d8		d8		-		d8		d8		d8		40
B / Week 2		d8		d8		d8		d8		-		-		-		32
C / Week 3		E10		E10		E10		E10		-		-		-		40
D / Week 4		e4		e4		e8		-		E10		E10		E10		46
E / Week 5		e8		e8		-		e4		e4		e4		e4		32
														Average		32
Key:
d8 = 8-hour day shift (6am to 2pm)
e4 = 4-hour evening shift (6pm to 10pm)
e8 = 8-hour evening shift (2pm to 10pm)
E10 = 10-hour evening shift (12pm to 10pm)
Coverage:		Fri		Sat		Sun		Mon		Tue		Wed		Thu
6am to 12pm		1		2		2		1		1		1		1
12pm to 2pm		2		3		3		2		2		2		2
2pm to 6pm		2		2		2		1		1		1		1
6pm to 10pm		3		3		2		2		2		2		2

 

Not only does this match the coverage requirements closer, it only requires 5 full-time employees (one less than the simplified 8-hour shift approach). 

 

Conclusions

It's tempting to look at the hours of operation (16 hours a day) and jump to the conclusion that this requires two 8-hour shifts. As we've shown, it's possible to develop schedules using two 8-hour shifts that come close to or exceed the coverage requirements. This certainly simplifies the scheduling process, so many restaurants will probably follow this path. However, we also demonstrated that this approach will result in higher costs along with periods of under and over-staffing.

 

If you want a schedule that is both effective and efficient, this is going to require more time and effort. Here are steps you will have to take:

• Track customer volumes by hour of the day for each day of the week.
• Create a table showing the coverage requirements (based on the customer volume history).
• Decide the most appropriate shift lengths that match the hourly workload variations.
• Develop a weekly work pattern that matches the daily variations.

If you want to get professional help with the shift length selection and work pattern design, please contact us to help: Request Quote.