Background
Thrive Early Learning Centres, a well-established provider of high-quality early childhood education, serves multiple locations and is known for its commitment to providing exceptional education and care to children. However, like many early childhood providers, Thrive faced challenges in efficiently managing their casual educator roster. With the growing demand of immediate relief staff and the complexity of rostering, Thrive needed a solution that would reduce the time and effort spent on administrative tasks while ensuring that ratios and compliance was always maintained.
To solve this, Thrive leveraged the integration between KinderM8, an all-in-one childcare management platform, and Save Our Service (SOS), a trusted provider of casual educators. This integration streamlined their rostering process and allowed them to manage their staffing needs more efficiently and cost-effectively.
The Challenge
Before the integration, Thrive faced several issues that made managing their casual workforce difficult:
- Manual Processes: Centre leaders spend a significant amount of time contacting agencies, confirming availability, and manually entering staff details into different systems. This fragmented process led to delays, over-spending of labour funds and inefficiencies.
- Staffing Gaps: Despite having a reliable pool of casual educators, Thrive occasionally faced difficulties filling shifts quickly enough, particularly when shifts were needed last minute.
- Time-Consuming Administration: The need to update rosters across multiple platforms created unnecessary complexity and added to the administrative workload, taking time away from other essential tasks.
Thrive needed a seamless solution that would allow them to easily fill shifts and manage their casual workforce in a way that didn’t add additional stress and burdens.
The Solution: KinderM8 and Save Our Service Integration
To address these challenges, Thrive adopted the integration between KinderM8 and Save Our Service. By linking their Kinder M8 roster management system directly with SOS’s pool of casual educators, Thrive was able to streamline their staffing process, making it more efficient.
Here’s how the integration worked for Thrive:
- Seamless Integration of SOS Casual Educators into KinderM8
With the integration, Thrive was able to book SOS casual educators directly through the KinderM8 platform. This eliminated the need for manual communication between Thrive and SOS, streamlining the process and reducing the risk of errors. Centre leaders could now fill shifts quickly and easily, all within a single system. - Time Savings in Staffing
By using KinderM8’s platform to request and confirm casual educators, Thrive saw a significant reduction in time spent on administrative tasks. There was no need to contact multiple agencies or manually update rosters—everything was handled in real time within KinderM8. This allowed the team to focus more on providing quality care to the children. - Real-Time Staffing Updates and Ratio Compliance
KinderM8’s seamless API integration with SOS provided instant updates whenever a casual educator was requested. This ensured Thrive had real-time visibility into staffing levels, allowing them to confirm ratio compliance at all times. With automated updates, they no longer had to wait for SOS confirmation, giving them confidence that shifts were being filled efficiently while maintaining compliance effortlessly.
Short-Term Impact
In the short term, the integration between KinderM8 and Save Our Service provided immediate benefits for Thrive:
- Reduced Administrative Load: By eliminating the need to manually communicate with SOS and update different systems, Thrive saved time and administrative effort, which could be redirected to other tasks.
- Improved Staffing Accuracy: The real-time updates allowed Thrive to ensure that all shifts were covered and that staffing ratios were met, without any uncertainty.
Long-Term Benefits
The long-term benefits of the integration were even more impactful for Thrive:
- Cost Efficiency
By streamlining the rostering process, Thrive reduced the time and resources spent on staffing coordination. This led to lower operational costs, freeing up resources to focus on other areas of the business. - Reliability in Casual Staffing
With the integration, Thrive could rely on SOS’s pool of qualified educators, confident that shifts would be filled promptly and efficiently. This consistency helped Thrive maintain a steady staffing level, even during peak times or last-minute requests. - Better Forecasting and Planning
With enhanced visibility into staffing levels, child occupancy, and workforce budgets, Thrive’s leadership team could make more informed decisions about centre operations. This proactive approach enabled them to anticipate staffing needs accurately, preventing overstaffing or shortages. As a result, they optimised resource allocation, ensuring their budget was spent where it mattered most.
Testimonial: Thrive Early Learning Centres
“The integration between Save Our Service and KinderM8 has been a game-changer for our centres. Before, managing last-minute staff shortages was a stressful and time-consuming process. Now, with just a few clicks, we can request casual educators directly within our rostering system, knowing that SOS will handle the rest. This has greatly improved our operational efficiency, allowing us to focus on providing quality care rather than scrambling to fill shifts. We highly recommend this integration to other centres looking for a smarter way to manage their staffing needs.”
— Thrive Early Learning Centres
The integration of Save Our Service with KinderM8 has provided Thrive Early Learning Centres with a powerful solution for managing casual staffing needs. By eliminating manual processes and centralising the rostering and staffing process, Thrive has saved time, reduced administrative work, and improved staffing efficiency.
This integration not only met Thrive’s immediate needs but also positioned them for long-term success by enabling better workforce management, reducing operational costs, and allowing for scalable growth. With KinderM8 and Save Our Service, Thrive has taken a significant step towards a more streamlined and effective staffing process.
Want to improve your staffing efficiency?
If you’re looking to streamline your casual educator staffing with your permanent rosters whilst reducing costs and administrative time, the KinderM8 and Save Our Service integration is the solution for your centre. Reach out to learn how this integrated platform can help your organisation operate more smoothly and efficiently.