Workforce Forecasting & Scheduling Lead

Company Description
Since we opened our doors in 2009, the world of commerce has evolved immensely, and so has Square. After enabling anyone to take payments and never miss a sale, we saw sellers stymied by disparate, outmoded products and tools that wouldn’t work together.
To solve this problem, we expanded into software and built integrated solutions to help sellers sell online, manage inventory, book appointments, engage loyal buyers, and hire and pay staff. Across it all, we’ve embedded financial services tools at the point of sale, so merchants can access a business loan and manage their cash flow in one place. Afterpay furthers our goal to provide omnichannel tools that unlock meaningful value and growth, enabling sellers to capture the next generation shopper, increase order sizes, and compete at a larger scale.
Today, we are a partner to sellers of all sizes – large, enterprise-scale businesses with complex operations, sellers just starting, as well as merchants who began selling with Square and have grown larger over time. As our sellers grow, so do our solutions. There is a massive opportunity in front of us. We’re building a significant, meaningful, and lasting business, and we are helping sellers worldwide do the same.

The Workforce Forecasting and Scheduling Lead is responsible for volume forecasting, long-range capacity planning, short-range demand planning and scheduling activities associated with both internal and external resources supporting products globally. This person leads a team to accurately predict workload and staffing requirements, both long and short-range, and scheduling staff to deliver an optimized plan that achieves our support objectives.
In this role you will ensure that the team - consisting of forecasting and scheduling specialists - creates and maintains statistical forecast models that incorporate business intelligence gathered from sales, marketing, finance and other sources. You will oversee building and maintaining staffing models that predict the staff required for internal and external resources, and you will manage the scheduling of those resources. You will handle requests for what-if analysis and lead your team in presenting it to senior leadership. You will be the leader responsible for team strategy and metrics (KPI) performance, overseeing decisions across infrastructure, personnel, process and work prioritization. Additionally, this role would represent Forecasting and Scheduling at a senior level within the organization, and be the subject matter expert within the company for Forecasting policies, best practices, and data.
You will:

• Lead world-wide rollup of forecast deliverables and scheduling
• Manage the forecasting approaches and models both within workforce tools and outside with excel to address specific growth
• Implement clear line of communication and expectations between workforce forecasting and scheduling and partners
• Take overall responsibility for achieving the Workforce Forecasting and scheduling team KPIs (Forecast Accuracy, SLAs, Capacity)
• Maintain detailed records of call/workload statistics and arrival patterns to maximize forecasting accuracy capability, ensuring cost-effective labor use. +/- 5% forecast accuracy for volume, handle time, and headcount needs
• Design new processes where needed, and improve existing processes to make the team more efficient and consistent
• Contribute to Workforce Management projects - Network Realignment, redundancy, design and reporting realignment
• Contribute to overall channel optimization strategy, including segmentation and redundancy
• Design and present a state of the business address to senior leadership regularly, being able to speak to our strategy, challenges, and influence decisions on workforce and partner related asks
• Hire and lead the Workforce Forecasting and Scheduling team - You will develop their skills, helping them grow in their roles, while ensuring the team provides high quality work
• Set the Workforce Forecasting and Scheduling team strategy and roadmap in collaboration with the Workforce Analyst team. Contribute to OKRs (goals and essential results), prioritization and sequencing of projects, and ensure important projects are delivered

Qualifications
You Have:

• Responsibility for delivering on challenging Forecasting KPIs (stretch goals)
• In-depth knowledge of call center statistics and technology
• Experience with Looker, or similar BI tools
• Experience with statistical forecasting models, such as time series and regression analysis
• BA/BS degree in an analytical field
• Design and present a state of the business address to senior leadership regularly, being able to speak to our strategy, challenges, and influence decisions on workforce and partner related asks
• Understand annual planning cycles and can contribute to overall strategy development
• Experience with Workforce Management tools (Teleopti, NICE IEX preferred), or experience with scheduling or analytical software
• Advanced Excel (can perform complex functions) and/or GSuites skills and ability to build logical forecast models
• 6+ years of work experience in Workforce Forecasting with 3+ years in a leadership role - hiring and developing great people, and establishing a collaborative and positive team culture

Preferred

• MA degree in an analytical field
• Experience using R and/or Python to forecast
• Proficiency using SQL

Additional Information
Block takes a market-based approach to pay, and pay may vary depending on your location. U.S. locations are categorized into one of four zones based on a cost of labor index for that geographic area. The successful candidate’s starting pay will be determined based on job-related skills, experience, qualifications, work location, and market conditions. These ranges may be modified in the future.
Zone A: USD $167,300 - USD $204,500
Zone B: USD $155,600 - USD $190,200
Zone C: USD $147,200 - USD $180,000
Zone D: USD $138,900 - USD $169,700
To find a location’s zone designation, please refer to this resource. If a location of interest is not listed, please speak with a recruiter for additional information.
Benefits include the following:

• Paid time off
• Perks such as WFH reimbursements and free access to caregiving, legal, and discounted resources
• Retirement Plans including company match
• Employee Stock Purchase Program
• Paid parental and caregiving leave
• Wellness programs, including access to mental health, 1:1 financial planners, and a monthly wellness allowance
• Learning and Development resources
• Paid Life insurance, AD&D. and disability benefits
• Healthcare coverage

This role is also eligible to participate in Block's equity plan subject to the terms of the applicable plans and policies, and may be eligible for a sign-on bonus. Sales roles may be eligible to participate in a commission plan subject to the terms of the applicable plans and policies. Pay and benefits are subject to change at any time, consistent with the terms of any applicable compensation or benefit plans.
US and Canada EEOC Statement
We’re working to build a more inclusive economy where our customers have equal access to opportunity, and we strive to live by these same values in building our workplace. Block is a proud equal opportunity employer. We work hard to evaluate all employees and job applicants consistently, without regard to race, color, religion, gender, national origin, age, disability, pregnancy, gender expression or identity, sexual orientation, citizenship, or any other legally protected class.
We believe in being fair, and are committed to an inclusive interview experience, including providing reasonable accommodations to disabled applicants throughout the recruitment process. We encourage applicants to share any needed accommodations with their recruiter, who will treat these requests as confidentially as possible. Want to learn more about what we’re doing to build a workplace that is fair and square? Check out our I+D page.
Additionally, we consider qualified applicants with criminal histories for employment on our team, and always assess candidates on an individualized basis.
Block, Inc. (NYSE: SQ) is a global technology company with a focus on financial services. Made up of Square, Cash App, Spiral, TIDAL, and TBD, we build tools to help more people access the economy. Square helps sellers run and grow their businesses with its integrated ecosystem of commerce solutions, business software, and banking services. With Cash App, anyone can easily send, spend, or invest their money in stocks or Bitcoin. Spiral (formerly Square Crypto) builds and funds free, open-source Bitcoin projects. Artists use TIDAL to help them succeed as entrepreneurs and connect more deeply with fans. TBD is building an open developer platform to make it easier to access Bitcoin and other blockchain technologies without having to go through an institution.