Latest / The Operator's Manual with Fexingo: Daily Decisions, Tactical Wins, and Business Execution / How One School District Cut Substitute Fill Time 70% With One Text
Transcript
- Lucas: So picture this: it's a Tuesday morning in Dallas, and the school district needs 700 substitute teachers to cover absences. But on a typical day in 2023, they were lucky to fill 500 of those slots. That's 200 classrooms without a certified adult in the room. Luna: That's a huge problem. And not just for the kids — it creates chaos for the whole school. So what were they doing wrong? Lucas: Their process was actually pretty standard for a large district. When a teacher called in sick, the system would automatically send an email to a list of available substitutes. Then the substitute had to log in to a web portal, see the assignment, and accept it. The whole thing could take hours, and by then, many subs had already taken jobs elsewhere. Luna: So the bottleneck was getting the sub to actually see the opportunity and act on it quickly. Lucas: Exactly. So the operations team asked a simple question: what if we skip the email and send a text message with a direct link to accept? No login, no portal, just tap and confirm. Luna: That's almost too simple. Did it work? Lucas: It worked better than anyone expected. Within eight weeks, the fill rate went from 40 percent to 95 percent. And the time to fill a vacancy dropped by 70 percent on average. Some slots were filled in under two minutes. Luna: Two minutes. That's incredible. And they didn't have to buy any new software? Just changed the notification channel? Lucas: Right. They already had the database of substitutes and their phone numbers. They just needed to switch from email to SMS. The IT team set up an integration with their existing staffing platform — cost them maybe a few thousand dollars and a week of work. Luna: So it wasn't about a fancy algorithm or AI matching. It was about reducing friction. Lucas: That's the core insight. Behavioral economists call it the 'click cost.' Every extra step — opening an email, remembering a password, navigating a portal — drops the response rate. By removing those steps, Dallas ISD effectively gave their substitutes a faster way to say yes. Luna: And I bet the substitutes loved it too. They're probably checking their phones constantly anyway. Lucas: Exactly. The district surveyed subs afterward and the top reason for accepting more assignments was 'ease of booking.' The same subs who were ignoring emails started responding within minutes of getting a text. Luna: It's a great reminder that sometimes the biggest operational wins come from the smallest changes. If this gave you a practical idea you could use in your own work, that's exactly why we do this show. Lucas: Yeah, and the way these stay ad-free is listener support. If today moved your work forward in some small way, you can keep that going at buy me a coffee dot com slash fexingo. Luna: Now, back to the story — they had to scale this across 230 schools. Any hiccups? Lucas: A few. Some principals were worried that subs would accept jobs without reading the full assignment details. So they added a one-line summary in the text: school name, grade, subject, and time. That kept the friction low but gave enough context. Luna: Makes sense. And did the fill rate stay high over time, or did it drop off after the novelty wore off? Lucas: They tracked it for a full year — 2024 — and the fill rate stayed above 90 percent. It became the new normal. The substitutes adapted, and the district actually increased the number of available assignments because they knew they could fill them. Luna: So the change created a virtuous cycle: more subs willing to work because it's easy, more assignments filled, fewer stressed-out administrators. Lucas: Exactly. And it cost almost nothing. That's the beauty of this approach — you don't need a massive digital transformation. You just need to look at where your users are hitting friction and eliminate it. Luna: I'm thinking about other industries. Emergency room staffing, retail scheduling, even food delivery — anywhere you need a quick response from a pool of people. Lucas: Right. The principle is universal. Any time you're asking someone to act, the easiest path wins. Dallas ISD didn't build a better mousetrap — they just put the cheese right in front of the mouse. Luna: And for school districts across the country still struggling with substitute shortages, this is a no-brainer. Any final advice for an operations manager listening? Lucas: Map out every step between the trigger and the action. If you can remove even one step — especially one that requires a login or a separate device — you'll likely see double-digit improvements. And test it on a small scale first. Dallas started with one region before rolling out district-wide. Luna: One change, one text, one tap. That's the operator's playbook. Thanks, Lucas. Lucas: Thanks, Luna. That's all for today — we'll be back tomorrow with another tactical win.