Employee Shifts & Planning in Odoo 18

Restaurants, retail stores, and service businesses managing shift schedules with spreadsheets face daily headaches: double-booking employees, calling team members to cover no-shows, manually tracking who's worked overtime, and scrambling to answer "Who's working Tuesday night?" Employees don't know their schedules until managers post them in the break room, leading to conflicts with personal commitments. When busy periods hit, there's no visibility into which skilled workers are available to pull in.

Odoo 18's Planning module centralizes shift management in a visual Gantt calendar where managers drag-and-drop assignments, automatically publish schedules via email, copy recurring patterns with one click, and leverage auto-planning to fill open shifts based on role availability. Employees access their schedules through a personal portal to request changes, view upcoming shifts, and manage time-off. Resource allocation across projects, sales orders, and departments becomes visible at a glance instead of buried in spreadsheets.

Understanding the Planning Module

The Planning module manages resource allocation—not just employees, but also equipment, vehicles, and materials—across time periods and organizational contexts (projects, departments, sales orders).

Core Concepts

Step 1: Access Planning Module

Installation

If Planning module isn't visible:

1. Navigate to Apps
2. Search for "Planning"
3. Click Install
4. Wait for module to activate

Step 2: Configure Settings

Accessing Configuration

1. Go to Planning module
2. Click Configuration → Settings
3. Configure options

Key Settings

Step 3: Define Roles

Roles categorize employees by skill set, enabling auto-planning and ensuring qualified workers fill shifts.

Creating Roles

1. Navigate: Planning → Configuration → Roles
2. Create Role: Click New
3. Configure:
   • Role Name: Descriptive title (e.g., "Chef", "Cashier", "Developer")
   • Resources: Assign employees or materials to this role
   • Color: Select color for visual identification in Gantt view
4. Save

Example Roles

Step 4: Configure Employees

Assign roles and working hours to employees for accurate shift allocation.

Employee Configuration

1. Navigate: Planning → Configuration → Employees
2. Select Employee: Choose employee to configure
3. Planning Tab: Set planning-specific details
   • Roles: Assign multiple roles employee can fill
   • Default Role: Primary role for auto-planning
   • Working Hours: Standard schedule (e.g., 9 AM - 5 PM, Mon-Fri)
4. Save

Step 5: Create Shift Templates

Templates streamline scheduling by saving common shift patterns for reuse.

Template Creation

1. Navigate: Planning → Configuration → Shift Templates
2. Create Template: Click New
3. Configure:
   • Template Name: "Morning Shift", "Evening Shift", "Weekend"
   • Start Hour: Shift start time (e.g., 8:00)
   • Duration: Hours (e.g., 8 hours)
   • Role: Default role for this template
   • Project: Optional project linkage
4. Save

Example Templates

Step 6: Schedule Shifts

The Schedule menu provides a Gantt calendar for creating and managing shifts.

Creating Individual Shift

1. Navigate: Planning → Schedule
2. Select View: Choose scheduling perspective:
   • Schedule by Resource: Assign shifts to specific employees
   • Schedule by Role: Organize by job functions
   • Schedule by Project: Allocate resources to projects
   • Schedule by Sales Order: Link shifts to customer orders
3. Create Shift: Click New or drag on calendar
4. Configure Shift:
   • Resource: Select employee
   • Role: Assign job role
   • Start/End Time: Define shift hours
   • Project: Optional project linkage
   • Sales Order Item: Optional customer order link
5. Save

Recurring Shifts

For repeating patterns (e.g., same schedule weekly):

1. Create first shift as described above
2. Enable "Repeat" checkbox
3. Configure:
   • Repeat Frequency: Daily, Weekly, Monthly
   • Until: End date for recurrence
4. Save - shifts auto-generate per frequency

Copy Previous Week

Duplicate entire week's schedule with one click:

1. Navigate to target week in Gantt view
2. Click Copy Previous Week button
3. All shifts from prior week copy to selected week
4. Adjust individual shifts as needed

Step 7: Auto-Planning

Let Odoo automatically fill open shifts based on employee availability and roles.

Using Auto-Plan

1. Create Shifts Without Resources: Define shifts with role but no employee assigned
2. Click Auto Plan Button: In Gantt view toolbar
3. Odoo Assigns: System automatically allocates employees based on:
   • Employee roles matching shift requirements
   • Availability (no conflicting shifts)
   • Working hours preferences
   • Workload balancing
4. Review & Adjust: Manually change assignments if needed

Step 8: Publish Schedules

Publishing makes schedules visible to employees and sends notifications.

Publishing Process

1. Select shifts to publish (or publish all for a period)
2. Click Publish button
3. Employees receive email notification with schedule details
4. Shifts become visible in employee portal

Step 9: Employee Self-Service

Employees access their schedules through the My Planning menu or portal.

Employee Features

Accessing Employee View

1. Employees log into Odoo
2. Navigate to Planning → My Planning
3. View personal schedule
4. Alternatively, access via employee portal

Integration with Other Modules

Planning module seamlessly connects with other Odoo modules for comprehensive workforce management:

Frequently Asked Questions

Conclusion

Odoo 18's Planning module eliminates shift scheduling chaos by centralizing resource allocation in a visual, drag-and-drop interface accessible to managers and employees alike. With automatic shift generation from templates, one-click schedule publishing, intelligent auto-planning that respects availability and roles, and employee self-service portals for transparency, you transform spreadsheet headaches into streamlined workforce management.

Whether you're managing restaurant staff across breakfast/lunch/dinner rushes, retail teams handling variable customer traffic, or project consultants billing clients by the hour, the Planning module provides the structure and flexibility to optimize resource utilization. Integration with Payroll ensures accurate compensation, Project links track billable hours, and Sales Order connections guarantee customer commitments are resourced properly—all from a single, unified scheduling system.