Creating a roster

Walk through the four-step PlanMyRounds wizard to generate a fair, rule-aware duty roster — set dates, staff, shift templates, and scheduling constraints.

Creating a roster in PlanMyRounds is a guided, four-step process. You set the dates, the shifts, the team, and the rules — the engine does the rest.

Only admins can create rosters.

Before you begin

A quick checklist before opening the wizard:

• Shift templates for your department are set up.
• All doctors who could be on duty are added to your team.
• Any leave requests for this period have been approved. The engine only respects leave that is already Approved when generation starts.

Open the wizard

Go to Duty Plans in the sidebar and select Create New Plan. The wizard walks you through four steps.

Step 1 — Period and details

1. Set the dates

   Choose a Start Date and End Date for the roster. Use the Next Week or Next Month quick buttons to save time.

2. Name it (optional)

   Enter a custom roster name so it’s easy to find later — for example, Cardiology — June 2026.

Step 2 — Shift configuration

Choose which shifts to include and how many doctors each shift needs per day.

You can either:

• Apply one shift pattern to every day of the week — fastest, good for stable rotations.
• Use a different pattern for different days — useful if weekends or specific weekdays need different cover.

Step 3 — Team selection

Pick the doctors who should be part of this roster. Filter by department or pod to quickly find the right group.

As you add doctors, PlanMyRounds runs a live coverage check. If you don’t have enough doctors to cover all the shifts across the full period, a warning appears.

Include a few extra doctors as a buffer. It gives the engine room to balance workload fairly and absorb unexpected absences.

Step 4 — Scheduling rules

Set the rules that govern how the engine assigns duties:

Rule	What it does
Max consecutive work days	The longest unbroken run of working days allowed.
Min rest days per week	Guaranteed days off per week.
Prefer same shift type per week	When on, tries to keep each doctor on the same shift type within a week. When off, balances day and night shifts equally.
Allow back-to-back duties	If enabled, a doctor can work two consecutive shifts (for example, a night then a day). Off by default.
Minimum rest hours between shifts	Always enforced, regardless of other settings.
Senior-to-junior ratio	The required ratio of senior to junior doctors per shift (advanced scheduling modes).

For a deeper look at how each rule is applied, see Roster constraints.

Generate the roster

When you’ve finished step 4, select Generate. The engine runs in the background — you’ll usually have a draft within a minute. Once it’s done, you’re taken straight to the roster detail page.

If generation fails

If the engine cannot find a valid schedule that satisfies every rule, the roster shows a Failed status with the reason. Common causes:

• Not enough doctors to cover the required headcount.
• Rules are too tight — for example, max consecutive days set too low.
• Too much approved leave in the period, leaving no one available on certain days.

Adjust the inputs (add more doctors, loosen a rule, or shorten the period) and try again.

Next steps

Review and publish

Check coverage and share the roster with your team.

Make manual edits

Adjust assignments before or after publishing.