The Dunning-Kruger effect describes something very human:
When we’re new to a topic, we tend to think we understand it more than we actually do. Not out of ego. Just because we don’t yet know the things that can go wrong.
Workforce management is full of this.
Plenty of teams say:
“We just have shifts and some time-off requests. It’s straightforward.”
And sure it is.
Until it isn’t.
Suddenly:
- People show up at the wrong times
- Shift swaps happen in WhatsApp at midnight
- One person ends up permanently stuck with weekends
- Coverage gaps appear at the worst possible moment
- No one knows who is actually working today
At that moment the realization hits:
Workforce management is real.
Even if you never use the term.
Why WFM is misunderstood
WFM sounds corporate. Heavy. Something for airports, hospitals, or national call centers.
Most team leads don’t see themselves as doing WFM.
But the moment you coordinate multiple people across days, skills, and availability…
you’re doing workforce management, whether you call it that or not.
This is where the Dunning-Kruger effect kicks in:
early scheduling feels simple, so managers assume it always will be.
So they stay in spreadsheets, Google Calendar, or a heroic memory system run by one person.
Those systems work perfectly.
Right up until they don’t.
The Soon idea
We build workforce management for people who don’t think they need workforce management.
Instead of making scheduling another task, Soon makes it a natural part of how you run your team.
Our core product philosophy:
- Anyone should be able to see who is doing what, today
- Scheduling should feel like arranging a plan, not fighting a system
- Leave and availability should make visual sense instantly
- Any change or exception should be simple to handle
You’ll see this reflected in how Soon works:
- Clear visual boards that show real shift structure
- Smart auto-scheduling that helps you build fair coverage
- Insights that connect staffing to actual workload
No jargon. No training. No “implementation phase”.
You use the product the same way you think about your team.
And when you don’t know the best scheduling move?
That’s fine too.
Soon can help, either:
- Through AI suggestions that improve your schedule automatically
- Or simply because the UI makes the next step obvious
Our belief is simple:
Software shouldn’t make you learn its language.
It should adapt to yours.
Final thought
The Dunning-Kruger effect in workforce management isn’t a failure. It’s a step in the journey. Everyone starts by thinking scheduling is easy. Complexity arrives slowly, then suddenly.
The question is whether your tools help you grow past that moment, or trap you in it.
Soon exists so teams don’t get stuck there.
