Labor spend, or labor cost, refers to the amount of money you spend on employment in your organization. This includes costs associated with staffing in-house employees, along with contract and temporary workers.

You can take many steps to reduce your labor spend. The easiest way to do this is by investing in shift management software that gives you automatic insights into the costs associated with your schedules.

If you are able to track and monitor employee schedules at a high level, you’ll be better able to spot opportunities for saving, such as rescheduling workers who are already in overtime or replacing agency workers with in-house employees.

Reducing your labor costs absolutely does not have to hurt the quality of your care. In fact, the same strategies that help you save money can improve patient care and employee satisfaction.

For example, one great way to save on labor is by preventing frequent overtime. When you do this, you’re both avoiding unnecessary costs and allowing your workers to get the rest they need to do their best work. Your budget, workers, and patients will all thank you for it.

For many healthcare employers, relying on agency workers is simply a reality of the job. But agency tends to be cost-prohibitive compared to in-house workers (not to mention, relying on agency can hurt your company culture and continuity of care).

There are two ways to reduce your agency dependence: by hiring more in-house workers, and by scheduling the in-house workers you already employ more strategically. Workforce management software can help you accomplish both of these goals.

With a smart shift scheduling platform, you can automatically create cost-effective schedules and get notified of opportunities to save. This software also helps you get ahead with scheduling build schedules further in advance, so can anticipate and prevent upcoming staffing issues.