Not every team works a standard nine-to-five, five-day week. Rotating shifts, overnight shifts that cross midnight, and multi-week rotas that vary week to week can now all be modelled properly, rather than managed outside the system or forced into a standard week that doesn't reflect reality.
A work pattern captures exactly when and how many hours a team or employee works, so that leave and allowances are calculated against their actual schedule.
What is a work pattern?
A work pattern defines the days and hours an employee works. Once assigned to an employee, it feeds automatically into leave entitlement calculations and the team calendar, so requests and allowances are worked out against a schedule that matches how that employee actually works, rather than a default assumption.
Three pattern types are available: a standard weekly schedule that repeats every week, a multi-week rotation that varies over a repeating cycle, and a rolling shift pattern for continuous rotations that don't follow the calendar week.
Work profiles renamed as leave profiles and rotas have been removed
If you've used work profiles before, work patterns will feel familiar, as they have taken over one part of what work profiles used to do.
Work profiles previously covered two distinct things in one place:
The working rota (which days and hours an employee works)
Leave settings (entitlements, sickness, carry over).
These have now split into two separate features. The working rota part has become work patterns, with more flexibility than before, including proper support for rotating and overnight shifts. The leave part hasn't changed, and now lives under a renamed leave profiles.
Nothing about how leave and entitlements are configured has changed. Only the working rota has moved, and it can now do more than it could before. See Guide: Leave profiles for what's changed there.
How work patterns fit together
Setting up and maintaining a work pattern happens in three stages.
Create a work pattern. Build the pattern itself: choose the type, set the schedule, and enter FTE information. See Create work patterns.
Assign it to an employee. Every employee has a work pattern assigned, either as a new starter or afterwards from their profile. See Assign work patterns to employees.
Edit or delete it later. Once a pattern is unassigned, it can be changed or removed. See Edit and delete work patterns.
How work patterns affect leave entitlement
Assigning a work pattern is what allows the system to calculate leave accurately, particularly for part-time or shift-based staff. Rather than assuming a standard working week, entitlement and half-day requests are calculated against the employee's actual working days and hours, as defined by their assigned pattern.