Adding Your Team
How to add staff members, what information is required, and how staff records connect to the rest of TurfWise
TurfWise works best when your whole team is in the system. Staff records feed into task planning, attendance tracking, skills matrices, wage cost calculations, and reports. This article explains how to add people correctly from the start.
What this page does
The Staff page shows a directory of everyone at your club. From here you can add new staff members, edit existing records, filter by role or department, and see weekly insights like wage costs and team utilisation. Each person's record stores their personal details, employment terms, compensation, and emergency contacts.
When you would use this
- You're setting up TurfWise for the first time and need to add your whole team
- A new starter is joining the club
- You need to update someone's role, hours, or salary
- You want to check team utilisation or weekly wage costs
What happens when you add a staff member
When you save a new staff record, that person appears in:
- Work Planning -- they can be assigned tasks
- Staff Directory -- visible to the team (filtered by your role's permissions)
- Weekly Insights -- their contracted hours and salary feed into wage cost and utilisation calculations
- Skills Matrix -- once you add qualifications and skills to their profile
- Attendance -- they appear in absence tracking and scheduling
If you don't add someone, they won't appear in any of these places. Planning tools can't assign work to people who don't exist in the system.
What to prepare before you start
Get this information together first. Adding staff goes much faster when you don't have to hunt for details mid-form:
- Full name and employee number (must be unique -- for example EMP001, EMP002)
- Email address (required -- used for notifications and login)
- Role -- choose from the list (Course Manager, Head Greenkeeper, Assistant Greenkeeper, Apprentice, Mechanic, etc.)
- Department -- Greenkeeping, Office, or Owner
- Start date and current status (active, probation, on leave, etc.)
- Contracted hours per week and annual salary (used to calculate hourly rate and wage costs)
- Holiday allowance in days (defaults to 28)
Standardise role names before you start
If your team uses inconsistent job titles, agree on standard names first. Roles drive permissions, reporting, and filtering. "First Assistant" and "1st Assistant" will be treated as two different roles.
How to add a staff member (step by step)
Go to the Staff Directory
Open Work > Staff in the sidebar, or go directly to /staff. Click the Add Staff Member button in the top-right corner.
Staff directory page
This article refers to a live TurfWise screen. Media is omitted here so the written steps stay current across releases.
Fill in personal information
Enter their full name, employee number, email, and optionally their phone number. All four fields are visible on screen at once.
Name, employee number, and email are required. Employee numbers must be unique across your club.
Set employment details
Choose their role from the dropdown (Assistant Greenkeeper, Head Greenkeeper, Mechanic, etc.), select a department, set their status (most new starters will be "Active" or "Probation"), and enter their start date.
Available roles
Course Manager, Deputy Course Manager, Head Greenkeeper, Deputy Head Greenkeeper, First Assistant, Assistant Greenkeeper, Apprentice Greenkeeper, Mechanic, Irrigation Technician, Gardener, General Manager, and Seasonal Temp.
Enter compensation and hours
Enter their annual salary, contracted hours per week, and holiday allowance. TurfWise automatically calculates the hourly rate from salary and hours.
You can also configure overtime settings here -- choose between paid overtime (with rate multipliers for weekdays, Saturdays, Sundays, and bank holidays) or TOIL (time off in lieu).
Add emergency contact (optional)
Enter an emergency contact name, phone number, and relationship. This is optional but recommended for health and safety compliance.
Save the record
Click Save Staff Member. You'll be returned to the staff directory where the new person now appears.
What to do immediately after saving
Once the record is saved, open their profile and complete these:
- Add qualifications and certificates -- especially PA1/PA6 spray licences, first aid, chainsaw certs. Add expiry dates so TurfWise can flag renewals.
- Set their shift pattern and availability -- this feeds into work planning.
- Upload key documents -- certificates, contracts, induction records.
- Check they appear in planning -- open Work Planning and confirm they show up as assignable.
You don't need to complete everything today
The core record (name, role, hours, salary) is enough to get someone into the system. You can add qualifications, documents, and shift patterns over the following days.
Common problems and fixes
Duplicate staff records
This happens when someone's name is entered slightly differently twice (for example "Tom Smith" and "Thomas Smith"). Before adding a new person, search the staff directory first. If you find a duplicate, delete the one with less data.
Permissions seem wrong for a staff member
Permissions are driven by the role field. If someone can see too much or too little, check their role is correct. Only Head Greenkeeper, Course Manager, and Admin roles can access the admin sections (Finance, Health & Safety, Projects).
Qualification expiry dates are missing
TurfWise flags expiring qualifications as a risk badge on the staff directory. If you skip expiry dates when adding qualifications, this warning system won't work. Go back and add them.
A staff member doesn't appear in Work Planning
They need to have a status of Active and contracted hours set. If their status is set to "Terminated" or their hours are zero, they won't show up as assignable.
Weekly wage cost looks wrong
Wage cost is calculated from annual salary and contracted hours. If either field is blank or zero, that person won't be included in the calculation. Check their profile.
Filtering and searching the staff directory
The staff directory has several ways to narrow down who you're looking at:
- Search bar -- type a name, employee number, email, or phone number
- Status filter -- show only active, on leave, probation, etc.
- Department filter -- show only Greenkeeping, Office, or Owner
- Role filter -- show only specific roles
- "Has risk" filter -- show only staff with flagged issues (expiring qualifications, overdue reviews, probation, upcoming absences)
You can combine filters. For example, show only active greenkeeping staff with risk flags.
Batch operations
You can select multiple staff members using the checkboxes on the left of the table, then:
- Export CSV -- download selected staff records as a spreadsheet
- Delete -- remove selected records (use with caution -- this is permanent)
Good habits that prevent issues later
- Add staff as soon as they're confirmed -- don't wait until their first day. If they're not in the system, they can't be planned for.
- Keep employee numbers consistent -- use a simple pattern like EMP001, EMP002. Gaps don't matter, but duplicates will be rejected.
- Add qualification expiry dates -- without them, TurfWise can't warn you when certifications are about to lapse.
- Review roles when responsibilities change -- if someone is promoted, update their role. This changes what they can see and access.
- Set contracted hours and salary -- these drive the weekly insights panel. Without them, wage cost and utilisation calculations won't include that person.
Where this fits in TurfWise
Staff records are used by:
- Work Planning -- to assign tasks to people
- Attendance and Absence -- to track who's available
- Skills Matrix -- to map qualifications and training across the team
- Reports -- staff names appear on weekly reports, committee packs, and compliance exports
- Finance -- wage cost calculations and labour budgets
- Today page -- staffing alerts and operational attention
If staff records are incomplete or out of date, these features will give you incomplete or misleading results.
Where to find it
Open Work > Staff in the sidebar, or go directly to /staff.