INTRO TO STAFFING ANALYSIS Presented by Bob Thomas, King County Auditor’s Office Liz DuBois, Principal, The Athena Group, LLC ALGA Webinar January 14, 2014

Moderator R. Kinney Poynter Executive Director NASACT Opening Remarks Speaker Bob Thomas Senior Principal Management Auditor King County Auditor’s Office (WA) Speaker Liz DuBois Principal The Athena Group LLC 2

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Staffing Analysis Context 4 Common questions: Are we staffed as cost-effectively as possible? How can we improve our efficiency without hurting service delivery levels? How do we determine how many staff we need? How much overtime is too much? What is staffing analysis and how can it help? Detailed analysis of personnel levels, plans, and costs. Determine how many people are needed to provide services, complete tasks, or cover fixed posts. Establish relationship between staffing and workload levels Examine the costs and benefits of employee overtime.

Webinar Overview Learn specific approaches and tools for staffing resource management. How to evaluate and improve staffing models. How to determine staffing needs. Tips for efficient overtime management. Specific context will be police, jails, call centers and institutions. Tools and skills may be just as applicable in other settings too. 5

How to Assess a Staffing Model? 6 What do you want to know? 1. How did the agency determine its desired level of staffing? 2. What method did they use to calculate the number of staff FTEs and overtime they need? Answers to these questions will help focus your analysis.

Elements of a Sound Staffing Model Key Questions to Ask 1. Does the model have core staffing policies and solid information about the work being done? 2. Does it provide points of comparison, such as workload history, variations by location, and costs per staff or post? 3. Is the level of staffing resources clearly related to meeting workload requirements or service delivery goals? 4. Has the staffing model been validated in any way? 7

Determining Staffing Needs Different methods exist to determine how many staff are needed. Focus on Post Staffing - one of the most common types of staffing in local government. Post Staffing Examples: Police patrol Jail Security Operations 911 call dispatchers Bus drivers 8

Post Staffing Overview and Issues What makes post staffing generally susceptible to analysis? There are methods used to calculate the amount of staff resources needed to meet planned staffing levels. Some common staffing issues encountered. Approaches to improve cost-effectiveness. How do we know how many posts are needed? Physical/Geographic: jail housing units, patrol districts, bus routes. Policy, safety or professional standards: minimum number of guards per shift to respond to emergencies, or police officers on duty. Performance standards: Answer 911 calls within X minutes; Available to respond to calls X% of time. 9

Staffing More Predictable in Institutions 10 Staffing levels mostly based on physical coverage needs If you know the floor plan and the custody level of the inmates/residents. If you know the operating philosophy and rules of the facility (e.g. direct or indirect supervision; number of officers per inmate/resident).

Staffing Less Predictable Outside Institutions 11 Staffing levels mostly based on workload and performance. Relatively easy to calculate number of police officers needed to provide basic patrol precinct coverage. More difficult to determine number of officers needed to respond promptly to 911 calls, and very difficult to determine needs related to crime prevention.

Post Coverage How do we know how many staff are needed to cover the posts? 1. Staffing levels for fixed posts. Need regular staff to cover each post all the time. 2. Also need staff to cover absences – to provide relief Weekends/days off Leave (vacation, sick, military, disability, bereavement) Training 3. How to calculate? Most comment approach is “relief factor.” 12

Relief Calculation Main Steps 1. Determine hours of post coverage needed. How many hours of staffing does one post require? 2. Calculate amount of available staff time. What is the maximum time is a staff person can be scheduled to work? How much time is one available after subtracting time off for vacation, sick leave, training, and other absences? 3. Calculate number of FTEs required to cover one post. Divide total post hours (1) by available staff time (2) 13

Relief Factor Calculation Example 14 Steps Hours per Year Calculation 1. Post Coverage NeededHours for one 8-hour post, 7 days/wk2,920 8 x Available Staff TimeHours employee is schedule to work2,080 8 x 5 x 52 Average hours an employee is absent382 Vacation Sick Military Bereavement Disability Jury Duty Etc. Average hours employee is available1,6982, Number of FTEs needed to cover one post Relief Factor1.72,920 / 1,698

What about Overtime? Why do we still have overtime??? Drawbacks of the relief factor approach: Does not take overtime into account. Based on average amounts of absences, and assumes they are taken evenly throughout the year. Real absences don’t occur this way – certainly for unscheduled absences but also for scheduled absences. There will always be some overtime in a post staffing environment! Absences can be difficult to predict, but tool to help are available. 15

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Binomial Analysis: Going Beyond the Relief Factor Use of averages for relief factors work fairly well when large numbers are involved, but fall short when small numbers are involved. Results of just one trial shown below. 17

Binomial Distribution Function In Excel Allows for Modeling Expected Numbers of Absences 18

Redefine the Question In a post situation, instead of asking how many staff do we need to provide coverage, Redefine the question to be: What is the most cost-effective mix of staffing resources that can be applied to provide coverage? 19

“Good” versus “Bad” Overtime When used to provide basic shift coverage, overtime can be a more efficient way to cover absences than hiring additional full time staff. Provides flexibility to meet scheduling gaps and spikes in workload. Full time staff receive benefits such as sick and vacation leave, health insurance, training, equipment, and vehicles. When these benefits are counted, regular time can cost the same as, or more than, the cost of overtime. Caveat: Amount of employee overtime worked needs to be safe and sustainable. Management should be aware of standards and best practices Monitor workload and overtime to ensure staff are not over-assigned. 20

Overtime Cost Comparison 21 Hourly Wage Fixed Benefits/ Costs Variable Benefits/ Costs Total Hourly Compensation Regular Pay$30$8$4.50$42.50 Overtime Pay (1.5)$45 $6.75$51.75 Total Annual Officer Cost $88,400 Total compensated hours (40 hours x 52 weeks)2,080 Straight Hourly Wage ($88,400/2080) $42.50 Paid hours of Sick and Vacation Leave, and other absences380 Actual Hours at Work 1,700 Fully Burdened Cost per Hour $52.00 Health insurance, equipment, uniform, etc. FICA, Retirement, L&I

Overtime Can Be Avoided or Reduced Even within post situations, overtime can be avoided or minimized. Better oversight, planning, or process streamlining. Examples of avoidable overtime Inefficiently managed scheduling. Work that goes beyond the regular shift schedule. 22

Example 1: Managing Employee Leave 23 Illustration of how the number of employees taking annual leave varies by day, and how it differs from the planned number of absences.

Example 2: Combining/Pooling Staff Police Patrol: 3 large patrol precincts subdivided into small “districts” each with fixed staffing levels Issue: Fixed staffing levels for small areas increased backfill overtime costs. Recommendation: Combine staff across districts and precincts and allow them to backfill for each other. Results: Reduced backfill overtime. Projected to save a minimum of $250k in overtime costs. Sheriff reports actual savings was $600k No reductions in staffing or service levels. 24

Example 2 Con’t: Combining Patrol Precincts 25

Strategies to Improve Overtime Management Calculate and compare the fully burdened hourly cost of OT and straight time – how different are the costs? Analyze overtime data – who is using it and why? Review OT approval policies and processes - do criteria exist for acceptable use? Analyze leave policies – is annual leave being closely managed? Analyze unscheduled leave use – trends? Look for potential economies of scale – possible to pool staff? Examine Comp Time policies – controls in place? 26

A closer look at Comp Time and why controlling it is important If an officer is absent and another officer fills in on overtime, and is paid for the overtime, the wage cost is 150% for the hours filled in (time and a half). Instead of being paid, suppose the fill-in officer receives Comp Time at 1.5 hours per hour worked. When that officer later take the Comp Time off, and if it is necessary to pay overtime for the person covering for them, then the wage costs of the backfill for the original absence is 225% (1.5 x 1.5). If there is chronic understaffing, the Comp Time compounding effect can continue. This can be mitigated by limiting the amount of comp time that can be earned, requiring regular comp time cash outs, and paying for the time worked instead. 27

Moderator R. Kinney Poynter Executive Director NASACT Questions? Speaker Bob Thomas Senior Principal Management Auditor King County Auditor’s Office (WA) Speaker Liz DuBois Principal The Athena Group LLC 28

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Want More Information? Course materials and templates available online here SAO Local Government Performance Center Reports that have used the approaches outlined in this presentation King County Sheriff's Office (2004): Performance Audit of Jail Overtime (2006): Pierce County Corrections Overtime Planning Study (2006) Performance Audit of Transit (2009), Technical Report C, Staffing 30 Liz DuBois (425) Bob Thomas Contact Information