Strike Teams
With the Strike Team feature enabled, you will be able to send a unit out on a special assignment and have the schedule reflect that change without dragging and moving employees around. Using the Assistant settings you have in place, it will use the qualifiers that you have set up to help fill in the roles needed. The feature is easy to use and will make a temporary change to your daily assignments easily.
Enabling the Strike Team Feature.
To use Strike Teams, you must have the Assistant module on and set up
To turn on the Strike Team feature, click on the Admin link at the top of your page.
Choose CrewScheduler/Calendars > Strike Teams and click the Enable Strike Team feature checkbox.
Here, you will see that you have options to set the work type for both regularly scheduled days, as well as days off.
For example, if the employee is on duty and is sent out on a Strike Team, they will only use the regular time rules but may make overtime on days they are off but out on a strike team. You can also choose where the strike team will appear on the Crew Scheduler itself. If the apparatus they are assigned to is usually stationed out of Station 1, you might choose to have it appear there.
Strike Team Blueprint
Think of your blueprint as what you have the potential to send out. So if a strike team is activated and you can send out a chief, an engine, and an ambulance, you will want the blueprint to represent that. Remember, the blueprint is just everything you have available that you can send. It does not mean that every apparatus has to be deployed. You can also send out individual resources, as long as you have that set up in your blueprint.
Remember that this is based on your assignments already set up on the Crew Scheduler. If you are sending out a single resource, you need to have an assignment to represent that. If you need help setting up a new assignment, you can read more here.
Additionally, assignments in a Strike Team blueprint must also have qualifiers/assignment rules attached to them. If you need help setting up qualifiers and assignment rules, you can read more here
To add an assignment to the blueprint, simply use the drop-down, select the appropriate assignment and click add
You can add and remove the positions, based on your previously set Assistant settings by simply clicking the 'x' next to the position. For example, Engine 1 normally required both an Engineer and an officer. But to go out on a Strike team assignment, you do not require both. You can easily remove that position from the assignment.
You can add positions with the drop-down as shown below.
Don't forget to click on the green Save Options button. The Strike Team button will not appear on the Crew Scheduler if you do not do this.
If you have enabled the Strike Team feature, the red box will appear in the top right-hand corner of the Crew Scheduler.
Deploying a Strike Team
When you get a resource order, it's your job to fill it as quickly as you can. And we've made it our job to make it simple to do so you can get on with your day. Whether a strike team is gone for 2 hours or 2 weeks, we've made it easy for you to keep your staffing seamless, even with the loss of a normally scheduled employee.
To start, click on the red Strike Team Roster button. It will open up this window.
As you can see, the selected assignments from the blueprint now show up on this screen. You can now fill in your personnel into the assignments as they qualify.
Let's deploy Engine 1 onto a strike team. First, we will make sure we have the box for Engine 1 checked.
Now, we can add the employees to the open slots based on the Assistant qualifiers. You can also override the qualifiers to place employees as needed.
Don't forget to set the time of deployment, including the dates. You can set them away for as long as needed and the system will pull them from any active duties and place them on the Strike Team. The Strike Team assignment takes precedence over any other assignment. Saving the roster ensures that the chosen employees are assigned to that deployment for the dates chosen. Any changes made to the deployment need to be saved once the change is made. The new shift calendar will reflect these changes as soon as you select the Deploy Strike Team button.
As you can see, the strike team now appears with the employees selected.
The Assistant should move the employees from their assignments into the Strike Team, shifting them from any preassigned shifts.
Making Changes to a Deployed Strike Team
When you click on the options menu of the Strike Team, you will get a drop-down menu that looked like this.
Adding an Additional Employee
If you need to assign an additional employee to a strike team for a certain period of time, click on Add Additional. The normal form will open, allowing you to add someone just like you would on a regular shift.
When you add users this way, you will have to make sure the shift hours and the work type are correct. This will also add an open slot to the shift, so if the employee is only scheduled for one day, the position will stay open if it is a multiple-day deployment.
Add an Open Slot
Clicking on Add an Open Slot will add a position to the Strike Team. The same window will pop up as above.
Edit Notes
Clicking on Edit Notes will allow you to edit or add additional notes for that particular day. The system will auto-fill the Strike Team identification number in the notes when deployed.
Add Assignment Label
Adding an assignment label will allow you to add an existing label, or create a new label for the Strike Team deployment, just like you can with a regular assignment.
Remind All Scheduled Employees
This allows you to send out a Notification to the employees you have scheduled to notify them of their new assignment.
Undo This Deployment
This allows you to remove the deployment as if it never happened, returning employees to their previous work shifts as assigned.
Edit Strike Team Deployment
Should the team return early from their assigned duty, this allows you to change their return date and time. If the deployment is only for a few hours, it will allow you to change the time without changing the personnel on the assignment. Additionally, the edit function will also allow you to add any notes. These are the only edits able to be made for this deployment.
Additional Personnel
If you are sending out a single resource (employee), or resources not connected to an assignment or apparatus, you can use the additional personnel feature for this.
To assign
Check the Additional Personnel box
Then Add personnel
Add the employee's name, then you can attach a qualifier to the position they are filling. Change the date and times as needed.
Remember to make sure the date and times match here.
Prior to deploying a Strike Team, ensure all individuals who have Trades or CallBack shifts are removed from those, for the duration of the deployment.
Once you save the roster, you'll be able to deploy the strike team on the days you've set it to. And it will show up on the Crew Scheduler.
If an employee is scheduled to work in a regular assignment once the deployment ends, they will populate in that assignment on the CrewScheduler only at the end time of the Strike Team deployment.
It is important not to have the term "Strike Team -" as any part of the name of an assignment. Doing so will cause the system to automatically create it as a deployment (to include changing the assignment color to red. Because the deployment did not originate from the Strike Team module, problems such as not being able to undo the deployment or otherwise edit it may arise.
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