Behind the management of 36 toast and coffee outlets, here’s how Singapore’s Ya Kun franchise streamlines its HR flow.
HR and finance folks would be able to tell us horror stories when it comes to payroll tabulation and flows.
Imagine having to sort through stacks of timesheets, punching numbers frantically into a calculator, then tallying against the staff roster for teams of employees when the month-end rolls around.
Even in the digital era, many HR, finance, admin or payroll managers still go through this tedious, lengthy process of payroll calculation, spending hours on inefficient work which could have been utilized for other more productive tasks.
In the past, Singapore’s famous ‘kaya’ toast and coffee franchise Ya Kun relied on manual tabulation and organization too – until they onboarded StaffAny‘s smart workforce solution.
StaffAny was able to fill up the workflow gaps for Ya Kun, ensuring that the 36 outlets of the Singapore heritage brand islandwide remains well-managed and organized internally to ensure the kaya toasts and kopi reaches you.
Once upon a time
Prior to 2020, Ya Kun was still using timesheets and WhatsApp chats to manually consolidate employee availability and scheduling. According to Jesher Loi, one of the third-generation of the Loi family running the business, this process was tedious and time-consuming, which led to a “huge drain on labor costs due to margins of error and rechecking”.
As part of the Singapore government’s goal to transform Singapore into a ‘smart nation’, businesses are encouraged to leverage on the latest technology to digitalize processes and drive business growth. And this includes HR – adopting technology for HR allows companies to accelerate business transformation while enabling a positive employee experience.
So how do brands like Ya Kun remain innovative?
This was where StaffAny came in. When Janson Seah, CEO and Co-Founder, StaffAny, presented the solution to Ya Kun, Jesher was intrigued.
Automation and optimization of staff rosters
StaffAny’s smart workforce management solution allows the automation and optimization of staff rostering, cutting down manual scheduling, thus saving an estimated 75% of time and improving efficiency for HR managers.
With the solution on board their HR processes, Ya Kun has since applied the solutions in 36 outlets islandwide. This removes the need for long WhatsApp chain messages and paperwork, thus reducing inefficient manual work. StaffAny’s smart on-site timeclock allows Ya Kun to customize parameters for staff clock-in and -out, preventing time theft and overtime costs, which has helped Ya Kun save a pretty penny each month.
The simplified process also increased productivity for Ya Kun’s HR managers, with more time to dedicate to enhancing workflow and value-adding to other work processes, such as the training and development of staff. The user-friendly interface has also simplified the process for Ya Kun’s senior employees and encouraged smoother transition to the new system.
With everyone having a clear overview of their rosters and operations in real time on one platform, Ya Kun also saw less pay discrepancies and miscommunication between HR managers and staff, building trust within the business and providing for a seamless workforce management.
Ya Kun is just one of the many brands StaffAny is helping. Since its launch in 2018, StaffAny has served large F&B chains such as the Royal T Group and the Kiosks Collective, as well as small business owners such as Good Luck Beerhouse and Foreword Coffee, among others across Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam, Indonesia and more.
