How to assign people automatically

How to assign people automatically#

For: Manager You’ll need: Shifts already created in the range you want to staff, and people who hold the right position at that location — see People.

Let Shiftavo propose who works which shift across a whole week or month. The result is a set of normal draft assignments: nothing is published, nothing is final, and you can change any of it in the calendar afterwards.

Start a run#

  1. Open Planning → Calendar.

  2. In the toolbar, click ‘Automatic assignment’ — the ‘Automatic assignment’ dialog opens.

  3. Set ‘From’ and ‘To’. Both days are included. A single run covers at most 8 weeks, and a range that is already over can’t be run.

  4. Optionally pick a ‘Location’. Leave it on ‘All accessible locations’ to plan everywhere at once — that needs a role whose data scope is ‘Whole company’. With a role limited to its assigned locations, pick one of them; otherwise the run doesn’t start and you see “Select a location you manage.”

  5. Choose how far the run may reach into published shifts — the default is the safe one.

  6. Tick ‘Keep the usual crew’ to lean toward the people who worked the matching shifts last period. It’s off by default.

  7. If your company uses demand forecasting, decide whether the forecast sets each shift’s target headcount, and whether it may go past the position’s maximum. Otherwise those two checkboxes aren’t shown.

  8. Click ‘Generate’.

Each of the six options is explained, with one example run through all of them, in What each option in the dialog does.

You land on the run page, which refreshes itself while the solver works. A typical week takes a few seconds.

Note

You need permission to assign people to shifts. If you can’t see the ‘Automatic assignment’ button, ask an Admin to check your role.

Review what it proposed#

When the run finishes you get a summary — how many assignments were added and removed, and how many errors and warnings the result carries — plus a table of every single change. See How to read the run report.

Read the report before you publish. The run respects hard rules, but it can’t know that Tuesday’s new starter shouldn’t be alone on a closing shift.

Adjust and publish#

  1. Click any shift in the report to open it, or go back to the calendar.

  2. Change assignments the normal way — the run’s output is ordinary draft assignments.

  3. Publish when you’re happy, as usual. See Publish horizon.

Tip

Run it again as often as you like. A second run re-plans the same range from scratch, so if you’ve since added shifts or someone’s availability changed, just generate again.

Verify it worked#

The calendar for that range shows people on shifts that were empty before, and the run page lists each of those assignments under ‘What changed’.