Build a Schedule Draft

Use Schedule Management to turn your organization’s services, clinicians, and constraints into a reviewable draft. A draft is the safe working copy: it can be generated, compared, edited, and sent through approval before it becomes the schedule people rely on.

Before you begin

Make sure you have:

1. Active services and clinicians in the organization.
2. At least one active constraint. A draft cannot be generated without constraints.
3. The correct date range in mind. The generator supports a custom range as well as 1-, 3-, 6-, and 12-month shortcuts.

Create a new draft

1. Open Schedule Management and choose Create Schedule Draft.
2. Leave Modify existing published schedule turned off for a new schedule.
3. Enter a clear Draft Label and select the Date Range.
4. Optionally select Base on Existing Schedule if the new draft should start from a previous schedule.
5. Choose a merge strategy. For multiple services, you can use one strategy for the whole schedule or choose a different strategy per service.
6. Select Create Draft Schedule.
7. Open the generator, confirm the date range, services, clinicians, and enabled constraint groups, then generate the draft.

The draft starts in a generating state. When the run completes, review the assignments before submitting it for approval.

Modify a published schedule safely

Published schedules are immutable. To change one:

1. Create a new draft.
2. Turn on Modify existing published schedule.
3. Select the published schedule to change.
4. Give the modification draft a useful label and select Create Draft Schedule.
5. Review and publish the new version when it is ready.

The modification draft inherits the original schedule’s date range. This keeps the published version intact while preserving a clear version history.

When a draft cannot be generated

If the solver reports that the schedule is infeasible, start with the hard constraints: coverage, eligibility, recurring unavailability, rest requirements, and maximum hours. Check that there are enough qualified clinicians for every required service and time window. If appropriate for your policy, make a preference or other nonessential rule a Best effort constraint instead of a Must constraint.

For a timeout, try a smaller date range, fewer enabled constraints, or a longer solver timeout.

Next steps

Use the calendar editor to inspect and refine the result, then follow review, approval, and publishing to make it available.