The Humanforce Demand Planning module allows you to improve your organisation's rostering efficiency by creating a formula to convert the key demand factor of your business into a number of required staff throughout each day. Managers will then be able to roster their staff accordingly through the dynamically updating demand information shown at the bottom of the roster.
Make sure you read our article on using the demand planner to learn how this functionality works for managers. This configuration article won't make much sense otherwise.
Enabling Access
In order to configure Demand Planning in your system, you will need to enable the following access permissions and all those beneath them against your access level:
- TimeTarget Online > View Administration Section > View Demand Plan Feed Setup
- TimeTarget Online > View Administration Section > View Demand Plan Feed Upload
- TimeTarget Online > View Administration Section > View Demand Plan Rule
In order for managers to have visibility of the Demand Planning information once you have created it and uploaded data they require the following access permission on their access level(s):
- Rostering Screen > Employee Rostering Screen > View Demand Planning
Demand Plan Configuration
The configuration of demand planning consists of two components: the Demand Plan Feeds - the external demand factor that drives the staffing requirement and the Demand Plan Rules - the conditions for calculating the required number of staff from the demand factor. The setup screens for both of these are available in the Admin section under System Configuration.
Demand Plan Feed Setup
The Demand Plan Feed Setup page contains the different feeds of data that will be used to calculate demand requirements from. Be aware of your naming conventions here as you will most likely require a separate feed for each area of the business.
A new feed can be created by clicking Add new record and consists of the following fields:
| Field | Description |
| Name | Description of the feed. This field is required. |
| Export Code | Short code that can be used on import files in place of the more descriptive name. |
| Numeric Format |
Defines the format the feed should be displayed to users in. Allows control of the number of decimals places or displaying as dollars for sales. If left blank defaults to 0.##. (Example formats: 0.####, 0.00###, 0.0000, $0.00) |
| Apply Value Across Date Range | Demand plan feed file upload allows a single date range value to be imported for all days within the date range.The data can be imported by setting-up the demand plan input-type with the option to apply values across data range. It is useful when the value is the same across a date range. |
| Is Spanned |
Determines whether imported data should be treated as being for a set point in time or whether it should apply consistently over a period. This will greatly impact the way you import figures into the feed. An unspanned feed will treat each figure imported as being for that specific point in time and works well where the data will be provided as frequent increments (such as expected sale per 15 minutes). A spanned feed allows for imported figures to be applied consistently over a period of time. For example, the number of guests at an event may be consistent for several hours and a spanned feed will allow the import of the guests with a to and from time to accommodate this. |
Demand Plan Rules
The Demand Plan Rules set the conditions for calculating required staff based on figures imported into the Demand Plan Feed. Each rule applies to a specific combination of location, department, role, area, event and function with at least location being required. Each combination can only have one rule that applies to it.
Demand Rule Definition
| Field | Description |
| Rule Name | Description of the rule - only used in the configuration screen. |
| Display Name | Name to be used for the Demand Feed in the roster. This allows you to take a specific feed for a location name accordingly and give it a generic name for managers. |
| Minimum Headcount |
Minimum number of required employees at any time. If the number of rostered staff is below this a warning is shown on the regardless of the demand requirement. |
| Maximum Headcount | Maximum number of required employees at any time. If the number of rostered staff is above this a warning is shown on the regardless of the demand requirement. |
| Location | Required. The Location to which this rule applies |
| Department | The Department to which this rule applies |
| Role | The Role to which this rule applies |
| Area | The Area to which this rule applies |
| Event | The Event to which this rule applies |
| Function | The Function to which this rule applies |
Demand Data Input Feed
| Field | Description |
| Demand Data Input Feed | The Demand Plan Feed input to be used to calculate the required staff on this rule. |
| Interpolation Mode |
When the times against imported feed data do not align to the hourly time increments on the employee roster Gantt view the demand planner must estimate an input value to be used within that time slot. This setting determines how that value should be calculated based on the 2 imported values on either side of the interval. The available options are:
|
| Interpolation range (minutes) |
When estimating a value defines the largest gap in minutes between two imported values that the demand planner is allowed to use for this estimate. Prevents inaccurate estimation where the imported values are too far apart. |
| Overlapped Spans Aggregation |
When the imported demand plan feed is spanned (applies across time rather than at a single point) it is possible that imported data may overlap. When this occurs this setting determines how the overlap should be resolved. Available options are:
|
| Interval Consolidation |
When values are imported more frequently than the hour intervals displayed on the employee roster Gantt view (e.g. if data is imported for each 15-minute interval) this setting determines how these values should be treated to align to the display. The available options are:
|
| Rounding |
After all the above functions have been resolved, apply rounding to the final input figure to be displayed on the roster and used for the required staff calculation. Available options are:
|
| Rounding Significance |
Define the level of rounding that should be applied by the rounding function. To round to whole numbers, use a value of 1. A value of 5 will result in only increments of 5 being used (e.g. 0, 5, 10, 15, etc). Values below 1 can also be used. |
Demand Formula
Once the above function has been applied the demand planner will now have a final input feed figure for the time interval. The following section then define the number of staff required per number of inputs that can be used to calculate the final required staff number.
E.g. if the data feed is providing the number of expected patrons, and the business requires 1 employee for every 4 patrons, then X = 1 and Y = 4. If the feed has a value of 20 patrons, then the required headcount is 20 / 4 * 1 = 5.
| Field | Description |
| X (Required staff) |
Number of staff required per Y units of input. |
| Y (input units) | Number of inputs units to require X staff. |
| Offset |
Raise the number of required staff by a fixed amount. |
| Required staff rounding |
Apply rounding to the final number of required staff. Available options are:
Rounding to at least 1 should always be applied to ensure a whole number of required staff. |
| Required staff rounding significance |
Define the level of rounding that should be applied by the rounding function. To round to whole numbers, use a value of 1. A value of 5 will result in only increments of 5 being used (e.g. 0, 5, 10, 15, etc). Values below 1 can also be used. |
Show Qualification Headcount
In addition to displaying the value of input data, the number of required staff and staff headcount and capacity shortfall or excess the demand planner in the employee roster Gantt view can also provide a count of the number of employees rostered with important relevant qualifications. To enable this qualification types can be moved from All available list to the Show list.
Demand Input Feed Upload
After the Demand Plan Feed and Demand Plan Rules have been configured the input feed data must be uploaded to enable it to be actually used in the employee roster.
Admin section under System Configuration.
The required file format for the upload is .csv in the following layout. Column names must match those provided exactly.
| Column Name | Format | Required | Description |
| Feed | String | Yes | The Name or Export Code of an existing input feed. |
| DateStart | DateTime | Yes |
The date and time of the value being imported. Various formats are supported. Recommended format is ISO (e.g. 2019-01-30T14:30:00 ) |
| DateEnd | DateTime | No |
For spanned feeds and date range imports only. This field holds the end date and time of the spanned feed value. It is ignored for unspanned feeds. Various formats are supported. Recommended format is ISO (e.g. 2019-01-30T14:30:00 ) |
| Value | Numeric | Yes |
The numeric value of the feed data. Can be provided in whole number or decimal format. |
Within the Demand Plan Feed Upload screen an option is available to include any lines with a value of zero which are excluded by default. Click the Select files button to choose the import file and upload it.