Choppers aims to increase its services, but to do so they must lower the amount of money spent on labor to free up capital. From the above data chart, conclusions can be drawn that more highly skilled workers average a significantly higher hourly wage as compared to other workers. These highly skilled workers also average significantly more total regular hours than their less skilled coworkers, but the overtime hours fluctuate regardless of total hours. The higher wages that non-skilled employees miss out on are made up for in increased overtime hours. While our group was only able to access information compiled between the peak fall season consisting of the last quarter months of October-December 2019, our strategizing would have greatly benefited from access to data from the summer as well. Complications occur when there is far too much data to be accounted for and not enough people or enough funds for softwares to properly run the numbers; a phenomenon often seen in small businesses.
Choppers Landscaping currently uses ADP for payroll services. But rather than rely on that, as well as paying a monthly fee for Quickbooks, the company could instead invest in a new software such as Housecall Pro. Housecall Pro is a system software that uses GPS tracking to track workers to determine how much time is spent at a single project location. This software also aids in billing and eliminates the need to spend excess time on data entry. Through the software, Choppers can use the data to determine the average amount of employees needed on a given day for a given project. The data collected over time can also be used to find the most efficient route for servicing the same weekly clients. The numbers would vary as peak months may require lengthier projects, so we propose using Housecall Pro to gather past data from regular clients that often pay for multiple projects a year. This data would be used as a predictor to determine the minimum number of full-time employees necessary at all times. If data generated from the software is used to predict that only six employees are needed to finish part of the project in a certain number of hours, it would then be unnecessary to have all eleven payroll employees onsite and being paid during that time.
By using the software to maximize productivity and determine the optimal number of employees needed per shift, Choppers can create a WorkForce Scheduling System. This system will determine when each employee works so that not all payroll employees have to be there at once. If employees must legally be paid at an hourly rate this scheduling system can help offset excess labor costs to reduce the overall amount of profits spent on payroll alone. As the current payroll employees are highly skilled, it wouldn’t make sense to seek out new full-time hires at a lower price. This also means that the option to subcontract workers doesn’t necessarily apply here as the cost would ultimately be the same and the company itself already currently uses subcontractors for hardscaping projects.
Due to the unpredictable nature of the field itself,where projects vary per month, alongside the software and workforce scheduling system, Choppers would have to rely on a Mixed Strategy utilizing a combination of part-timer workers and undertime. Choppers can even further breakdown this data by analyzing the total hours worked per project by every full-time employee rather than by totals per quarter. From there, average total overtime hours can be determined. In this particular quarter there was a total of 215.50 hours in overtime. More highly skilled employees doing overtime significantly increases the cost spent on payroll, but by removing them to offset costs, it can have an equally negative impact on productivity in the end.
Highly skilled workers are essential to the business but rather than spend more on paying full-time employees for overtime, Choppers can instead use Indeed or other similar job sites to advertise work on a part-time unpaid undertime basis. This means the company would be able to reach out to these employees as needed and have them kept on payroll without having to deal with the cost and time of training and maintaining new-hires. With this strategy workers will be on payroll, but only paid for actual work completed rather than for simply being on-site. So while Housecall Pro’s data can only be used as a predictor the undertime paid strategy would be used alongside it to ensure all projects can be successfully completed and make up for where it lacks. This combination would increase the scope of hiring while still maximizing productivity for full-time employees and together that will ultimately lower the cost of maintaining payroll.
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