Improved Staff Scheduling Helps The California Wildlife Center Nurture & Protect Our Planet

At Humanity, we believe in the work that non-profit organizations do in our local communities and around the world, and one way we like to give back is to offer Humanity for free for organizations with unpaid volunteers. Our ongoing goal is to help non-profit organizations with staff scheduling as we know that scheduling volunteers is one of the most challenging tasks for management staff.

The California Wildlife Center is a non-profit organization that operates a wildlife rehabilitation facility, providing care and medical treatment to thousands of injured, sick and orphaned wild animals every year. They are committed to creating a healthy, sustainable planet that values all life, and achieve this by taking responsibility for the protection of all native wildlife through rehabilitation, education and conservation. The California Wildlife Center provides a service free of charge to the public, and receive no state or federal funding. Humanity is proud to serve a selfless organization that gives back so much to the local community, native wildlife and planet.

Managing six employees and almost 100 volunteers in various locations, this non-profit relied heavily on self-scheduling, but desired a way that ensures they have the necessary number of individuals for each shift. For many years, they used pen and paper to organize and track shift schedules, but it was a constant issue to keep track of shifts and fill open shifts and they found this method to be cumbersome and ineffective. Humanity helps to automatically eliminate unnecessary and unexpected volunteer shortages. Last minute changes are no longer a panic-frenzy as Humanity is designed to immediately locate replacement volunteers with our integrated SMS messaging system that places volunteers and staff with instant notice of schedule changes. Time spent juggling volunteer schedules was time that the California Wildlife Center wanted to better spend focusing on more critical operations.

Since they have switched to Humanity’s workforce management software, their staff scheduling process has become much easier:

Their staff were trained to use the application most effectively and, now, filling open shifts and coordinating staff availability is accessible for all, easy-to-use and saves them time and valuable paper. With 24/7 access to the schedule, trading shifts and more, as opposed to the pen-and-paper method, shift coverage has improved dramatically while still giving staff control over the schedule. From both an employer and employee’s perspective, Humanity’s web-based staff scheduler has been a positive change.

Humanity’s application is flexible and can cater towards dynamic organizations with numerous staff and variable locations. The California Wildlife Center has found the use of remote site locations to be extremely valuable, as they juggle staff between multiple locations, depending on wildlife needs. Maintaining communication among staff is key, particularly when dealing with several remote sites locations, and the ‘Message Wall’, has been useful for staff communication and spreading the word on upcoming events and needs in their various animal care programs.

Humanity commends and thanks the California Wildlife Center for all the work that they do, and the past 14 years of service. Read the full case study here. We look forward to continuing our relationships with non-profit organizations like the California Wildlife Center and giving them more time to focus on their causes through less time spent scheduling.

Happy Scheduling!