Staffing and labour costs: Keep hours and money in view

The calculation does not yet show whether lunch service has enough staff, someone can open the café, or cleaning fits into the closing shifts.

At Monoplan, we start with three questions: What do we expect to sell? Which work needs doing, and when? What actually happened?

Café Nord is an illustrative example. All figures are hypothetical, and revenue excludes VAT. The 30% target belongs to this example; it is not an industry benchmark.

Build the revenue forecast from comparable days

A revenue forecast is your best estimate of future sales. Start with comparable days: the same weekday, season, opening hours and operating conditions. Review unusual events separately before using them as a reference.

Café Nord uses previous Fridays to estimate DKK 24,000 in net revenue. The manager then reviews bookings, local events, holidays and the weather forecast.

Weather can affect demand and its timing, particularly when a café has outdoor seating. Use the café's own history to judge the likely effect. Sunshine is not a fixed percentage to add to sales.

Consider three scenarios. For this example, the manager estimates DKK 22,000 for a quiet Friday, DKK 24,000 for the expected case and DKK 28,000 for a busy day. Weather forecasts carry uncertainty; DMI provides uncertainty information for rain, temperature and wind. Use the weather to inform your assessment and review it closer to the day.

Forecast productive hours

For this example, Café Nord uses DKK 750 in revenue per productive staff hour as a planning reference:

DKK 24,000 / DKK 750 = 32 productive hours.

Here, productive hours mean the hours needed for café operations, including preparation, service, replenishment, cleaning and closing. Essential tasks count even when they do not generate an immediate sale.

The DKK 750 reference should come from the café's own experience of days when service and workload were acceptable. It is not a universal performance target for individual employees.

The café also budgets four hours of paid breaks across the day, bringing the total to 32 productive hours and 36 paid hours. Paid breaks are an assumption in this example; your schedule must follow your own applicable terms.

Check minimum coverage separately. Opening, required skills and fixed tasks can require more hours than the revenue calculation suggests.

Turn the hours into a staffing profile

A staffing profile sets out how many people and which roles are needed throughout the day.

Time	Work to cover	Active staff	Productive hours
07:00–10:00	Opening, preparation and morning service	2	6
10:00–12:00	Barista and kitchen	2	4
12:00–15:00	Barista, kitchen and two service staff	4	12
15:00–18:00	Barista and service	2	6
18:00–20:00	Late service, cleaning and closing	2	4

This profile requires 32 active staffing hours. Build break cover and overlap into the individual shifts so coverage holds when someone takes a break.

Lunch needs four people for three hours: 12 staffing hours. Roles matter as much as headcount. Four service staff do not cover a missing kitchen role.

Describe the work before assigning names. Then match it with roles, skills, availability and absence. This is also the approach in our shift planning guide.

Calculate labour cost as a share of revenue

The calculation is:

Labour cost / revenue excluding VAT × 100.

For Café Nord: DKK 7,200 / DKK 24,000 × 100 = 30%.

DKK 200 is an illustrative average total cost per paid hour. Your real schedule should reflect employee rates and the relevant pay components and employer costs included in your calculation. Evening and weekend premiums can make two shifts of equal length cost different amounts.

Use the same period, department and cost basis throughout. Calculate a weekly percentage from total weekly cost and revenue, rather than taking a simple average of daily percentages.

If the staffing profile exceeds the budget, investigate the mismatch. Can tasks move? Can overlap be placed more effectively? Is the revenue forecast realistic? Fewer hours help only if the café can still do the work.

Compare planned and actual time

Friday ends with DKK 22,000 in net revenue and 39 approved paid hours. Using the same simplified hourly cost:

Measure	Plan	Outcome
Revenue excluding VAT	DKK 24,000	DKK 22,000
Paid hours	36	39
Calculated labour cost	DKK 7,200	DKK 7,800
Labour cost percentage	30.0%	35.5%

There are two separate variances. Lower revenue alone would have raised the percentage to 32.7%, even with the planned 36 hours. The extra three hours cost another DKK 600. Together, the two variances bring the labour cost percentage to 35.5%.

Review both sales and hours. Was the forecast too high? Did guests arrive at different times? Did closing take longer? Was there a delivery, training or a missing clock-out?

Keep the plan as a reference. Review recorded time, resolve missing entries and breaks, and approve the payroll basis. Time records should reflect work performed; they should not be adjusted to make the budget fit. Financial follow-up needs the agreed and checked payroll basis.

What we take into Monoplan

The main lesson behind our work at Monoplan is that hours and money need to be explained together. A daily total does not tell you whether lunch is covered. A high labour cost percentage does not, by itself, prove that staffing was wrong. Actual revenue does not turn a planned labour cost into an actual labour cost.

We therefore keep expectations, the schedule and follow-up distinct. Monoplan's revenue module compares schedule-based labour costs with a revenue forecast or actual net revenue for the same period. The cost still comes from the schedule. Approved actual hours and payroll data need to be reviewed separately from that estimate.

In this workflow, the manager reviews the revenue forecast, weather and staffing profile and uses them as inputs to scheduling in Monoplan.

Explore shift planning in Monoplan and the process from schedule to approved payroll data.

Start with one day in the next schedule

1. Forecast revenue for a specific day and record the assumptions.
2. Estimate the required hours, then check fixed tasks and minimum coverage.
3. Distribute coverage by time and role, including break cover.
4. Calculate schedule costs and the labour cost percentage on a clear basis.
5. Compare the outcome with the plan and use the explanation in the next forecast.

Start with next Friday: Write down the productive staff hours and roles needed from 12:00 to 15:00.