How to assist in organizing remote work in different time zones and in 7 shifts?

About MIND Solutions: Supporting US-based clients remotely from Croatia

MIND Solutions is a Croatian company partnered with Creative Technology Solutions, a US-based service provider. Together, they bring cutting-edge IT practices to the US healthcare industry, providing technical and customer support to over 500 healthcare facilities in 30 US states. It is a fast-growing company with a strong focus on people development and progress.  

Both companies have the same American owner. The Croatian company currently employs more than 100 people, while its US partner company has over 40 employees. Creative Tech specializes in remote support and server and network maintenance. Their clients are healthcare institutions that include nursing homes, long-term care facilities, rehabilitation centers, pharmacies, laboratories, hospices, etc.  

According to the Zagreb-based MIND Solutions Finance and Administration Department, “MIND Solutions provides technical and user support exclusively to Creative Technology Solutions and its clients.”  

The support is provided remotely for the US market. MIND Solutions' employees can choose their own working model; remote, office-based or hybrid. 

MIND Solutions' cloud environments host tens of thousands of users, all Creative Technology Solutions' clients. They use a wide range of technologies to develop solutions in VMWare, HyperV and Microsoft Azure environments.

Find out more about the company:
https://careers.mindsolutions.io/
https://hr.linkedin.com/company/mindsolutions

Challenges: How to manage 7 work shifts for US time zones

"Spica's solution has been the only one on the market so far that has been able to meet our needs regarding time and attendance tracking. This is because our work takes place in different time zones and depends on different ways of working. It's not so much about on-call and standby duty as it is about very different work shifts. Then there are also allowances for working night shifts, on public holidays, night shifts on public holidays, etc.," says B. K. J., Director of Finance and Administration at MIND Solutions. 

Another reason SPICA All Hours makes their job easier is that it allows for different viewing rights depending on the employee. For example, HR can see all information about all employees, whereas others have limited access to the data they can see or modify.  

Their organization of work is very particular as the employees work in 7 different shifts. The first shift starts at 3 pm, which is 8 am in Chicago, and works until 11 pm. The second shift starts at 4:30 pm and finishes work at 00:30 the next morning, which is 5:30 pm in Chicago. There are also two local shifts, one from 7 am to 3 pm and one from 11 pm to 7 am.  

In addition, the company has two levels of on-call shifts. Basic on-call shift solves simpler problems that are critical to the work of the companies they support. These are on-call hours during the weekend. The second type of on-call shift runs from Friday evening on, all week. This takes care of critical infrastructure, which requires a high level of technical expertise. The seventh shift is administrative. 

"Spica has been very helpful in adding all these shifts to the new solution. It's working very well at the moment," says M. J., Director of Support Services at MIND Solutions

Solution: One report instead of several

Other solutions on the market were suitable for much simpler work organization models than the one used by MIND Solutions.  

B. K. J.: "This solution, which we introduced at the beginning of this year, has saved me a lot of time. Before the implementation of Spica's solution, I had to combine at least four to seven internal reports to get a monthly timesheet. Now we can get it in one report, so we only need to work on details."

M. J. adds that the system works very well operationally, too. When introducing it to the employees, they had hardly any questions. "The system is very intuitive," adds B. K . J.

In this phase, Spica assisted in preparing the data and setting up the system by providing consulting services. Simultaneously Spica:

• Offered a free trial that allowed MIND Solutions to test situations/cases before making a purchase decision,
• Carried out a pilot phase with a group of users; only then the system implementation was scaled up,
• Included (remote) support in the price,
• Made sure the initial investment was low: Spica first offered the company a subscription-only solution that included no hardware, meaning that everyone registered via computer.  

Employees now register attendance in different ways. "But we do have information in the system about who is working from home and who is in the office. This doesn't affect their salaries, though, which are regulated by their employment contracts. " adds B. K. J.

Employees can see the shift schedule and also request to change shifts. However, they cannot change shifts by themselves, the change must be approved and entered by the supervisor.

Results

• Less time spent, more useful reports.

"The time I spend on reports every month has now decreased by approximately 5 to 10 hours," says B. K. J. and stresses how much it means to her that she no longer has to combine 4 to 7 reports into one. "It may not seem like a big deal to some, but it makes a big difference to me. I can access certain reports at any time, which wasn't always the case before." 

M. J. is still making the shift schedule manually, but by entering it in All Hours, he saves three to four hours a month.

"Given the complexity of our shift system, it's not possible to make it automatic," he says

• All Hours upgrade coming soon. 

In the future, we wish to integrate All Hours with our HRM systems.

"Next year, we will export all relevant data, such as data on absences, from Spica's solution to a different system for work organization support. This way, our managers will immediately see when someone is absent and will be able to react quickly," adds M. J.

The software has been developed internally. None of the ERP solutions fitted the specific requirements of their different departments, so the company decided to develop an in-house solution.