Labor assignments

A labor assignment links a worker and zone to a parent work order for a shift. It records a start time, planned hours, organization, revision, status and decision time. Shift Supervisor drafts the assignment after the parent job has a clear owner and labor estimate. Submitted is the handoff to Labor Reviewer. Approved and Rejected make the review outcome visible to the floor; Completed records the end of the assignment lifecycle.

Consider a dock reset that needs coverage during the afternoon shift. Shift Supervisor names the worker, dock zone, start time and expected hours. Before submission, the supervisor compares that span with the team’s existing approved coverage for the same zone. Labor Reviewer sees the parent work order and the assignment revision before making a decision. A rejection sends the coverage back for correction rather than silently changing an approved plan.

• Draft coverage. The supervisor can shape the worker, zone, start and planned hours while the assignment remains Draft.
• Submitted coverage. Submitted assignments form the review queue and retain their revision for a decision.
• Decided coverage. Approved and Rejected outcomes tell the operations team what staffing can be followed.

Agree how zones are named and how a worker’s name is entered. The worker field is text, while the team member directory carries staff identity and user access. A clear naming convention prevents one person appearing under several spellings. Choose the unit and time-zone convention for start times and planned hours, especially for shifts that cross midnight or span multiple work orders.

Decide who may submit, who reviews and what evidence the reviewer expects from the parent work order. The review decision record holds an outcome, reason, reviewer, source revision and operation key. That gives the team a practical decision trail. Decide how a rejected assignment returns to Draft or is replaced, and how a completed assignment relates to the work order’s later acceptance. These steps should be rehearsed with the people who will operate them.

Submit a zone assignment for the dock reset and ask Labor Reviewer to inspect the parent job, start time, worker and planned hours. Introduce a second proposed assignment in the same zone and overlapping period. The reviewer should catch the collision before approval and record a reason for the rejected coverage. Then correct the plan, submit its new revision and record a fresh decision. Confirm that both the original rejection and later approval remain traceable to the parent work.

Finally, mark the approved assignment Completed after the shift. Compare its planned hours with the work evidence that the worker recorded. The assignment is the staffing plan; the evidence is the account of work actually performed. The distinction helps a manager see whether a job used more labor than expected.

• Submitted assignments — Zone coverage waiting for the reviewer.
• Approved zone coverage — The coverage the supervisor can follow.
• Rejected assignments — Decisions that need a revised staffing plan.

Use assign labor for the staffing handoff and review assignments for the decision rehearsal.