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Setting Up CoverageFinder

William Allgood
Updated

Applies to: Account & Hotel Administrators, Hotel Managers

Many hotels are faced with ongoing coverage crises. CoverageFinder™ is designed to help scheduling managers fill shifts with the people that already work in your hotels. There are four simple ways to fill hotel schedules through CoverageFinder:

  1. Post open shifts;
  2. Search for labor across hotels;
  3. Assign shifts to employees across hotels;
  4. Enable Shift Swap for employees. 

Any property can use open shifts to find coverage within their existing workforce. Once the setup described in Step 3 below is complete, employees will be notified of open shifts that they are qualified to work and can pick up the shifts in our MyHotelTeam mobile app. Review our Knowledge Base to learn more about open shift scheduling.

Options B and C above are only applicable if you have multiple hotels in the same market. Please complete Steps 1–3 below to share labor across hotels. 

Lastly, you can save managers time by enabling Shift Swap. Instead of the manager contacting team members to get shift coverage when someone cannot work, that associate can get their shift covered by offering it or swapping it with another associate within our MyHotelTeam mobile app. Please review the information in Step 4 to enable your employees to swap or offer shifts with each other.

Step 1: Group hotels to enable labor sharing

If your portfolio has multiple hotels in the same area, we highly recommend that you group them together to share labor. In other words, you are creating a labor pool for hotels in proximity to share workforce. Your account may have one or more labor pools.

Once this setup is complete, scheduling managers can start searching for potentially available labor across hotels (Option B).

 

  1. Mouse over your username on the top right corner in Hotel Effectiveness.
  2. Select Settings from the dropdown menu.
  3. On the Scheduler/MyHotelTeam card, click on Team Sharing Setup.
  4. Select a custom hotel group or a portfolio from the dropdown menu.
  5. There are two alternatives to group hotels:
    • Quick Setup - linking all hotels within 20 miles automatically
      • Click the Quick Setup Hotels button on the upper right.
      • Select the link Assign all hotels within 20 miles to each other.
      • Click Submit.
    • Manual Setup -  linking hotels manually
      • Click to open the hotel.
      • Click to add hotels one by one.
      • Click Submit. 

Step 2: Decide how far in advance other hotels are allowed to schedule your associates

Linking hotels in proximity doesn't open up your employees for others to grab immediately. Hotels in the same labor pool must complete this step and Step 3 so that scheduling managers can assign shifts and post open shifts across hotels (Option A and C).

This step controls the setting for Employee Sharing and Open Shifts. Both are defaulted to Yes. There is no need to adjust them unless you want to opt out. The only thing to consider is how far in advance other properties are allowed to schedule your associates.

 

 

To review or edit employee sharing settings:

  1. Mouse over your username on the top right corner in Hotel Effectiveness .
  2. Select Settings from the dropdown menu.
  3. On the Scheduler/MyHotelTeam card, click Advanced Scheduler Settings.
  4. Select the hotel from the dropdown menu on the Advanced Scheduler Settings page.
  5. Decide when other hotels are allowed to schedule your employees. 
    • Do all hotels share labor freely in the same labor pool?
      If your company decides that all hotels have equal opportunities to schedule the workforce available within the same labor pool, you don't need to change anything in this step. The default setting is no limit to when another hotel can schedule your employees.
       
    • Do you want to reserve the first right of scheduling your employees?
      If you want to schedule your employees before other hotels in the labor pool, we recommend that you set a limit in this step. For example, if your hotel typically finalizes the schedule 14 days before the scheduled work week, you can set a limit of 13 days—allowing other hotels to schedule your associates 13 days before the start of the scheduled week.

      If other hotels in the labor pool have different work weeks from yours, we recommend that you set a limit of at least 8 days in this step. In other words, other hotels can assign shifts to your employees 8 days before the start of your scheduled work week.
       
  6. Clickto open the settings of Sharing Employees.
  7. Select Yes next to Limit when another hotel can schedule this hotel's employees.
  8. Enter the number of days before the start of the scheduled week.
  9. Save.
     

Good to Know

When you allow managers to assign employees positions at other hotels, it simply means that your managers are given permission to proceed with the employee setup described in Step 3 below. Other hotels can't schedule your employees until you have added their hotel positions to your employee profiles.

  

Step 3: Set up employees to pick up open shifts or be scheduled by other hotels

Identify which of your employees are cross-trained to work additional positions at home hotel or affiliated hotels. Home hotel managers must add those positions to employee profiles so that employees can:

  • pick up open shifts from home hotel or other hotels (Option A), or
  • be assigned shifts to work at other hotels (Option C)

To assign employees positions at other hotels:

  1. Select Employees in the left main menu.
  2. Mouse over Employee Manager in the top menu; then select Employee Explorer.
    (If you don't see Employee Manager in the top menu, you are not given the access to view employees.)
  3. Select the employee's home hotel from the drop-down. 
  4. Select View/Edit to the right of the employee.
  5. Select Edit to the right of Extra Positions Assigned.
  6. Select the other hotel from the drop-down menu (If you don't see the hotel, Team Sharing may not have been enabled for that hotel yet). 
  7. Move the position(s) you would like to add from the Available Positions box to the Assigned Positions box using the > icon.
  8. Select Save Positions.

 

Alternatively, this can also be completed through Scheduler:

  1. Select Scheduler in the left main menu.
  2. Mouse over Employee Setup in the top menu; then select Assign Positions to Employees.
     
  3. Select the employee's home hotel from the drop-down. 
  4. Select Edit/View to the right of the employee.
  5. Select the other hotel from the drop-down menu (If you don't see the hotel, Team Sharing may not have been enabled for that hotel yet). 
  6. Move the position(s) you would like to add from the Available Positions box to the Assigned Positions box using the > icon.
  7. Select Save Positions.


 

 

 

How to opt out of employee sharing and open shifts

If your hotel does not want to partake in sharing employees or using open shifts, you can always opt out.

  1. Mouse over your username on the top right corner in Hotel Effectiveness .
  2. Select Settings from the dropdown menu.
  3. On the Scheduler/MyHotelTeam card, click Advanced Scheduler Settings.
  4. Select the hotel from the dropdown menu on the Advanced Scheduler Settings page.
  5. Click to open the settings of Sharing Employees; select No to disable the feature; save your edit.
    NOTE: Other hotels in the labor pool can still see potentially available employees at your hotel even if you opt out of Sharing Employees.
  6. Click to open the settings of Open Shifts; select No to disable the feature; save your edit.
     

Step 4: Enable Shift Swap for employees

Determine if you would like for your employees to be able to swap and/or offer shifts with each other in MyHotelTeam.  If yes, enable Shift Swap in Scheduler. 

  1. Navigate to Scheduler in Hotel Effectiveness.
  2. Hover over Shift Swap then select Shift Swap Settings from the dropdown menu.
  3. Set your selections to allow regular hourly employees to see other regular hourly employee schedules in MyHotelTeam.
  4. Set display options regarding how employee names are seen within Shift Swap.
  5. Turn on/off the setting for employees to be able to swap or offer shifts.
  6. Turn on/off whether manager approval is needed for shift swaps or shift offers.
  7. Click Save

Review our Knowledge Base to learn more about Shift Swap.

 

How to opt out of employee sharing and open shifts

If your hotel does not want to partake in sharing employees or using open shifts, you can always opt out.

  1. Mouse over your username on the top right corner in Hotel Effectiveness .
  2. Select Settings from the dropdown menu.
  3. On the Scheduler/MyHotelTeam card, click Advanced Scheduler Settings.
  4. Select the hotel from the dropdown menu on the Advanced Scheduler Settings page.
  5. Click to open the settings of Sharing Employees; select No to disable the feature; save your edit.
    NOTE: Other hotels in the labor pool can still see potentially available employees at your hotel even if you opt out of Sharing Employees.
  6. Click to open the settings of Open Shifts; select No to disable the feature; save your edit.
     

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