Self-rostering in the NHS is a flexible approach to workforce scheduling that allows team members to manage their own shifts. Self-rostering prioritises individual preferences while maintaining the staffing levels required for high-quality patient care.
The BMA, NHS Employers AND NHS England recommend self-rostering or flexible working as the “aspirational best practice for outstanding employers”.
The following royal collages have mentioned or done papers on self rostering: RCEM, RCA, RCN and RCP.
With HealthRota, self-rostering is easy, efficient and safe – enabling you to:
- Improve Work-Life Balance: Choose shifts that align with your personal commitments.
- Enhance Team Collaboration: Easily coordinate with colleagues to ensure fair and equitable scheduling.
- Maintain Compliance: Automate rules for safe staffing levels and working hours.
How self-rostering works in HealthRota
- Set the Framework: Managers define the shift requirements, staffing rules, and deadlines for submitting preferences.
- Submit Preferences: Team members log into the HealthRota app to indicate their preferred shifts, availability, or time off.
- Manager review: Managers have the option to adjust the selected shifts and fill any gaps still outstanding.
- Collaborate and Adjust: Once published, staff can swap shifts or make adjustments (with manager approval) directly through the platform.
When self-rostering has been introduced the results speak for themselves time and time again: improved staff satisfaction, reduced costs on locums and admin, and improved recruitment and retention. Check out our Brighton self-rostering case study for more details.
The benefits of self-rostering with HealthRota
- Recommended by BMA & NHS Employers
- Self-rostering is recommended by the BMA and NHS Employers as the “aspirational best practice for outstanding employers”
- Fair and Transparent
- Ensure equality across your team with automated conflict resolution and visibility into the rostering process.
- Improved Retention
- Ensure equality across your team with automated conflict resolution and visibility into the rostering process.
- Enhanced Productivity
- Empowered staff are more motivated and engaged.
- Seamless Integration
- HealthRota integrates with your existing systems to streamline payroll, leave management, and compliance.
- Reduced Absenteeism
- Aligning work schedules with personal preferences leads to fewer conflicts and less burnout.
- Optimised Staffing
- Meet patient demand effectively without overloading your team
- Cuts Admin Costs
- Reduce administrative overhead with automated scheduling and fewer rota disputes
- User-Friendly Interface
- Our clean, intuitive design makes rostering simple for everyone
Feedback on Self-Rostering
It saved us. It was amazing. If you can imagine a control room with your Chiefs planning your team, that is what we did. We were able to stop everyone from moving around and still ensured our workforce got regular breaks, their annual leave when requested and that we still had sufficient capacity to meet the demands of the Covid pandemic despite the number of staff not able to work. We built resilience into the team and so during wave one, not one doctor felt that they were being overworked. It was unbelievable.
Most other competitors that report to allow self-rostering have got the process a little wrong. I email everyone on the rota and they login and people self-allocate their shifts, but with other systems I would have to ‘ok’ each one of those requests and when you’re looking at almost 2000 shifts every two months, that’s just not possible. The fact that HealthRota almost “crowdsources” this part of it, makes things really quite simple.
It’s amazing the difference self-rostering can do to both staff morale and burnout. With the survey we did, registrars are happier. Happier staff mean better care for patients.
We’ve noticed a massive decrease in sickness on the registrar rota, because people are just more flexible. There’s more flexibility on the rota, which is great. We’ve also had a big impact on cost.
Much more flexibility for trainees. Easy to book annual leave can schedule work like around social life easily (and) better for morale overall. Less long runs of days or night if you prefer…
I think it’s great – especially because you can choose the weekends you’d rather not work because of other commitments.
It’s absolutely fantastic. This rota gives us ownership, feel valued as a team member, inclusive and allows our voice to be heard. Creates a better work life balance.
HealthRota has been invaluable in giving me flexibility for my personal and professional leave. It is very easy to use and gives a clear overview of staffing. As teaching fellow I have needed the flexibility to optimise my work opportunities, I could easily swap my shifts and leave to ensure I didn’t miss out and could contribute. I have never had such a flawless rota before… I cannot praise this rota enough and would be sorely disappointed if it was withdrawn.
This is such a great system – I have received 100% of the annual leave and unavailable days I have requested in both my clinical fellow job and my current training job. It makes such a difference not feeling that sense of dread when trying to get annual leave granted for important life events and marking unavailable days where you actually want your zero days is so much better than having them randomly allocated to days that are not useful. It is an excellent system and a massive selling point.
