Custom-Designed Employee Work Schedules
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In surveys of more than 20K shiftworkers, we asked them about their shift length preferences for 24/7 coverage. We did it in a way to avoid directly mentioning specific shift lengths as shown in the graph below:
We found that asking specific shift lengths did not give reliable answers since it was based on perceptions rather than actual schedules. When we showed the shiftworkers actual schedule examples using different shift lengths, here is how they responded:
Ratings definitions:
5 = I like it a lot
4 = It has potential to be good
3 = neutral or not sure
2 = It doesn't look promising
1 = I don't like it
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When covering 24/7 with 10-hour shifts, most people think it takes three shifts since you would simply be replacing the three 8-hour shifts. The problem with three 10-hour shifts is that you are really covering 30/7 which can increase the staffing requirements by 25% or more.
For example, suppose you need 2-person coverage on every shift. With 8-hour fixed shifts, this would require 9 employees (3 per shift). With 10-hour fixed shifts, it would take 12 employees (4 on each shift). This is a 33% increase in the staffing, making it unaffordable for most organizations.
This is not the case for all situations, however. Let's say you needed 2 people on the day and afternoon shifts and only 1 person on the night shift. WIth 8-hour fixed shifts, this would require 8 employees. With three 10-hour fixed shifts, this would require 10 employees. But if you used FOUR 10-hour shifts, it would only require 8 employees. Here's one way to match that.
Assign 2 people to each of the following four 10-hour shifts.
This would produce 2-person coverage from 6 am to 10 pm and 1-person coverage from 10 pm to 6 am. With 2 people on each shift, there would be one day every week in which both people are scheduled to work (since everyone is working 4 shifts or 40 hours per week). This would give you 4-person coverage from 6a to 10p and 2-person coverage from 10p to 6a on that one day every week. You could use this extra coverage for group meetings, training or other purposes.
This approach only works if the coverage for 16 hours a day is double the coverage for the remaining 8 hours. So it would work if you needed 2-person/1-person, 4-person/2-person, 6-person/3-person, 8-person/4-person and so on.
If you want to get really complicated, you could boost the coverage on one shift. This would give you extra coverage for that 10-hour period. For instance, you could assign 4 people to the afternoon shift. This would give you 2-person coverage from 6a to 12p, 3-person coverage from 12p to 10p, and 1-person coverage from 10p to 6a.
Obviously, this can get really complicated. If you are dead-set on adopting 10-hour shifts, why not contact us for help. Get started by filling out this form:
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The best schedule for any group that works 24/7 depends primarily on 2 things: (1) the workload distribution, and (2) employee preferences. The workload distribution and associated coverage requirements should be the starting point for all scheduling decisions. Starting with anything else will lead to ineffective or inefficient solutions. Read this article for a more complete explanation: https://www.shift-schedule-design.com/Blog?m8:post=the-real-purpose-of-a-shift-schedule.
Workload Distribution. If the workload is steady at all times, 8-hour or 12-hour shifts would be the best choice. If the workload varies by time-of-day, you will either need to allocate more staff to certain shifts or adopt a schedule with overlapping shifts (e.g., 10-hour shifts or combined 8 and 12-hour shifts). If the workload varies by day-of-the-week (or weekdays vs. weekends), you will need a custom-designed work pattern.
Employee Preferences. If you ask employees for their preferences, roughly 80% will say 8-hour shifts. However, if you show them examples of 8 and 12-hour schedules, 80% will prefer the 12-hour schedules. That's why it's important for them to see actual examples rather than just voicing an opinion on what they want.
There is more than just shift length to consider, of course. Should you have fixed shifts or rotating shifts (https://www.shift-schedule-design.com/Fixed_Shifts)? What are the best shift start/end times (https://www.shift-schedule-design.com/Blog?m8:post=fatigue-in-the-workplace-early-day-shift-start-times)? What's the best way to handle absence coverage (https://www.shift-schedule-design.com/Blog?m8:post=how-to-cover-absences)?
If you would like to learn more, please fill out this form to get a quote for our schedule design services (Request Quote).
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When changing to a 24/7 schedule, companies often face a number of issues they didn't anticipate. They knew they'd need a new day-on-day-off pattern. And they probably knew they'd have to hire more staff. However, they may not have known about issues related to skill distribution or the need to revise pay policies to match the new schedule.
The more a company digs into this type of project, the more complicated it becomes. Questions such as: “Can we run an 8-hour schedule on one line and a 12-hour schedule on another?” Or, “What should we do with the new schedule if demand drops?” Eventually, the project manager or team will get around to the broad question of “What about supervision?”
This is often left to the very end. There are several reasons for this. First of all, number-wise, there are far fewer supervisors than hourly shift workers to worry about scheduling, so they should be easy to deal with. Additionally, supervisors are managers, so they should be considered “team players” that will do whatever they are called upon to do. And finally, companies simply underestimate the impact of supervision on their operation.
This is not to say that companies think their supervisors are unimportant. They just often fail to realize just how important that position is. Here are a few key points that we think are important when it comes to your supervisors:
Supervisors are managers AND shiftworkers. They must straddle the wall between the needs of the company and the needs of the people they supervise. When the company needs to get something done, it is the supervisor who sees to its accomplishment on the shop floor. If the workforce has an issue with something, the supervisor is seen as their advocate to get them the help they need. This is a complicated dance, and it takes a special talent to pull it off well.
If a supervisor is weak, his or her crew will under-perform. This sounds obvious but it's often quite difficult to detect. A poor supervisor will do at least one of the following: (a) blame upper management for difficult decisions instead of taking on the responsibility himself, (b) direct the workforce with an authoritarian fist rather than leading them through coaching and encouragement. The result will be a workforce that is anti-company. This will show up in small ways such as higher than expected absenteeism, periodic quality issues and safety problems. An employee who feels he or she is not part of the company will perform at a level below that which they are capable of. A good supervisor will bring out the best in his people while a poor supervisor will bring out the worst.
Supervisors need to be on the same schedule as the people they supervise. This will cause a two-way ownership that is important to the smooth operation of your facility. This perfect matching of schedules will enable a supervisor to say “those are my people”. At the same time, the employees will be able to say, “that is my supervisor.” Each knows the other. The supervisor understands his workers' abilities and weaknesses. The workers understand expectations. Communications between the two are consistent. Feedback, both ways, is more readily understood and accepted. When we go to plants where supervisors are on a different schedule from the people they supervise, we know there will be big problems. There will be a lack of accountability, poor communications, duplication of efforts and important projects left unattended because “someone else was supposed to do it.”
The more supervision is included in the decision process, the more they will support it. All too often, I'll ask a supervisor, “Why is this being done this way?” only to get the response, “I don't know. No one tells me anything.” Do not miss any opportunity to empower your supervisors. Keep them informed and when possible, let them help to make the decision. If they are left out of this loop, expect them to become more “hourly” oriented and less management focused.
A shift schedule change represents an ideal opportunity to get your supervisors involved. Let them know what is going on and invite them to participate in resolving issues; there will be plenty to go around.
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Even when employees understand the need for the employer to change from operating 5 days a week to 7 days a week, they aren't very receptive. Yes they are fed up with regularly working 6 days a week and sometimes all 7 days. Even though they will get more days off (and more full weekends off) on a 24/7 schedule, they resist the change.
I thought you might like to read some of the typical comments from employees facing this major change:
If we choose to go to 12-hour shifts, will everything over 8 per day still be overtime or will it change to only being over 40 hours a week?
Seniority and how the people working those new shifts will be selected. Vacation/personal days (how they work). Holiday pay. Coverage of shifts for call-outs, sick days and vacation. Do we still get paid for not taking a lunch break? If we work 12-hours, how does that work?
How will working a 24/7 work week will affect the wear and tear on the equipment used on a daily basis?
Can this be done with an 8-hour shift? Does everyone have to work 12 hours?
What about those of us who need all the OT we can get because our bills can't be paid without it? Do we get a second job?
If I would have to work the overnight shift, everything in my life will be affected. I would also hope my pay to stay the same or get better.
Overtime is very important to ALL of us because a lot of us are under-paid and need it to make ends meet. So please keep that in mind as well.
The fact that we are being forced to make a decision that increases the company's profit, and in turn we have to bend over backwards to do it and get no sort of compensation to do it. It's bullshit and greedy.
How does seniority relate to any of this?
I understand the reason for 24/7 operation. However, this process to me is just another way management confronts challenges/issues. In short, the management team does not address the core problem. Rather they address the symptoms of the core problem.
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10-hour shifts are a popular choice among employees. However, when used with companies working 24/7, the 10-hour shifts create a few problems. The biggest is that it takes three 10-hour shifts to cover the day. This means the company is actually running for 30 hours a day instead of 24, which will boost the staffing requirements by at least 25%.
And, if that's not bad enough, how do you handle the fact that the shifts overlap one another for 6 hours a day? Do you overlap each shift by 2 hours or do you consolidate the overlap so there are 6 consecutive hours of double coverage?
If you overlap each shift for 2 hours, do you have one shift sit idle, while the other works? That seems pretty wasteful. The exception would be police departments where the first shift can go back to the office to do paperwork, while the second shift is out on patrol.
If you consolidate the overlaps, you might be able to take advantage of the double coverage. Maybe there is a special project that can be tackled, areas that can be cleaned / repaired, or a new production line that can be operated. Companies with variable work volumes can align the 6 hours of overlap with the busy period to match the coverage with the workload. The downside, of course, is that this may result in some weird shift start and end times that won't appeal to employees.
If you are considering 10-hour shifts in your 24/7 business, I hope you'll read the other articles I've written about the limitations of 10-hour shifts. Here are links to the most popular articles:
1. https://www.shift-schedule-design.com/10-Hour_Shifts
2. https://www.shift-schedule-design.com/Blog?m8:post=10-hour-shift-schedules-and-police-management
3. https://www.shift-schedule-design.com/Blog?m8:post=10-hour-shift-schedules-for-police-officers
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When companies expand from working 5 days a week to 7 days a week, they start by having the current employees work overtime on the weekend. Over time, however, management faces a tough choice:
Continue to rely on weekend overtime. To avoid alienating the current workforce, management can continue relying on weekend overtime to meet demand. Unfortunately, the situation will eventually become worse with excessive costs, lower productivity, quality and safety issues, and personnel problems such as increased absenteeism and turnover. By the time management realizes this, employees will have become addicted to the overtime and it will be difficult to change anything.
Hire a weekend crew. The company can keep the current employees on their Monday through Friday schedule and hire new employees for a weekend crew. Because it's difficult to find and retain good part-time employees, companies usually hire a full-time weekend crew that works 12-hour shifts on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Double coverage every Friday is expensive. So is the common practice of paying the weekend crew for 40 hours instead of the 36 hours they actually work. Less experience on the weekend crew results in lower productivity. Personnel that work weekends often do so to get their foot in the door. After a year or more of waiting to be hired, they may get frustrated, leading to increased turnover and absenteeism. You can read more here: https://www.shift-schedule-design.com/Blog?m8:post=weekend-crews.
Adopt a 24/7 schedule. While the two options discussed above minimize the impact on the current workforce, they have some serious disadvantages. They might be safe from a labor relations perspective, but the cost can be considerable. The best way to avoid those costs is to adopt a 24/7 schedule. I've previously recommended a process to follow: https://www.shift-schedule-design.com/Schedule_Selection_Process. I've also discussed incremental steps to take: https://www.shift-schedule-design.com/Expand_from_5_to_7_Days. For examples of different 24/7 schedules, please check this out: https://www.shift-schedule-design.com/Schedule_Examples.
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Search for information about 24/7 schedules and you'll find multiple websites showing examples of popular work patterns, e.g., Continental, Pitman, DuPont, 6-on-3-off, 4-on-2-off, etc. You get the impression that these schedule templates are good for any group that works around-the-clock. All you need to do is choose the option you like best.
This is highly misleading. There are three reasons why:
Coverage. Smaller organizations rarely need the same number of people working at all times. Yet the free templates found on the Internet produce constant coverage on a 24/7 basis. The primary reason you have a schedule is to match the coverage with the workload, so why would you want a schedule that doesn't do that? It would be a huge waste of your resources.
Staffing. Each template works best with a specific number of crews (usually 4). If your staff size isn't a multiple of this number, the crews will not be the same size which will result in uneven coverage. Another staffing issue has to do with schedule attractiveness. Some templates look great, but require way more employees than other, more efficient patterns. Don't get seduced by a schedule's attractiveness.
Pay Week. Each template works best for a certain overtime / pay week, e.g., Sunday to Saturday. Some schedules can be modified, but some can't. This can result unbalanced work week hours and in the loss of weekends off for employees.
So, if looking through popular work patterns is not a good way to find a new 24/7 shift schedule, what's the best approach?
You should always start with the workload distribution and the associated coverage requirements. How many people do you need at work on each shift? Does this stay the same all week?
When we design schedules, we compare the coverage requirements with your staff size and the average hours worked each week to determine what is feasible. Sometimes, overtime may need to be built into the schedule to avoid gaps in coverage. Occasionally there may be more staff than necessary, so we'll show you different ways to utilize these "extra" resources.
We then evaluate your schedule preferences to see if this creates any problems. If the resources are adequate for the coverage and scheduling preferences, we start the actual shift schedule design. Often, we can apply common scheduling patterns as a starting point, and modify them to fit your unique circumstances.
We create several different shift schedule options to show you the range of possibilities, such as the number of consecutive days worked, different shift lengths, relief coverage, and so on. The goal is to satisfy your specifications and explore possibilities you may not have considered.
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If you've searched my website for articles about 10-hour shifts, you'll see that I have a pretty negative opinion toward them in 24/7 operations. Here are links to some of those articles:
10-Hour Shifts in 24/7 Operations (shift-schedule-design.com)
10-Hour Shifts for 24/7 Coverage (shift-schedule-design.com)
10-Hour Shift Schedules and Police Management (shift-schedule-design.com)
10-Hour Shift Schedules for Police Officers (shift-schedule-design.com)
Most of the issues I raise are management concerns, like the fact that 10-hour shifts require at least 25% more staff than 8 or 12-hour shifts. Nevertheless, employees tend to believe that 10-hour shifts are the ideal shift length. They would do anything (maybe including a pay cut) to get them. Since employees love them so much, maybe it's worth the extra cost. After all, wouldn't it be great to have a happy, enthusiastic workforce?
The table below shows the staff needed to different levels of coverage:
Coverage per Shift
Staff Required on Each Shift
Total Staff Required
Avg. Weekly Hours
1
2
6
40
2
4
12
40
3
5
15
42
4
7
21
40
5
9
27
40
Coverage levels greater than 5 would either be a multiple of one of the levels shown or it would require a custom-designed schedule. For example, 6-person coverage would use a schedule for 3-person coverage, whereas 7-person coverage would require a custom-designed schedule.
With some of these coverage levels, the schedule would have one or two overlapping days. This will produce more coverage than needed. This is necessary to ensure 40-hour work weeks. You can only avoid this by having an occasional 30-hour work week, which few employees would tolerate.
3-person coverage is the only level that would require some overtime in the schedule (a 50-hour work week once every 5 weeks). If you want to avoid the OT, you'd have to employ 6 people per shift or 18 total employees. I don't think it's worth it, but that's your call.
Want to see a few templates for your coverage requirements? You won't find these elsewhere on the Internet. They have to be custom-designed. Please fill out this form to get an idea of what we would provide and how much we would charge:
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A majority of the organizations that cover 24/7 use 8-hour fixed shifts. That would be fine if it weren't for the fact that employees hate the schedules. The universal complaint is that they don't get enough days or weekends off. They simply want a better work-life balance.
The employees think 10-hour shifts would be a good choice, but the increased staffing requirements prevent most organizations from adopting them. Most employees don't want 12-hour shifts, though when they see actual examples of 12-hour schedules, they often change their minds. But let's focus this article on 8-hour shifts.
There are a lot of different patterns with 8-hour fixed shifts. Unlike 12-hour schedules that normally use 4 crews, 8-hour schedules can use anywhere from 6 to 27 crews. The number depends on the coverage levels, as shown in the table below:
Coverage
Staffing
Total
Average*
Weekends
Possible
Pattern
Pattern
Pattern
Per Shift
Per Shift
Staff
Hours/Week
Off (max)**
Patterns
#1
#2
#3
1
2
6
37.3
1/2
2
Max. 7 days
Max. 4 days
2
3
9
37.3
1/3
3
Max. 8 days
Max. 7 days
Max. 4 days
3
4
12
42
1/4
5
Max. 7 days
6-on-2-off
Max. 5 days
3
5
15
33.6
2/5
2
Max. 7 days
Max. 5 days
4
6
18
37.3
1/3
3
Max. 7-8 days
Max. 5 days
4-on-2-off
5
7
21
40
2/7
2
Max. 7 days
Max. 5 days
5
8
24
35
3/8
1
5-on-3-off
6
8
24
42
1/4
5
Max. 7-8 days
6-on-2-off
Max. 5 days
6
9
27
37.3
3/9
1
Max. 7 days
6-on-3-off
* Average Hours/Week often can be increased to 40 by requiring occasional extra coverage
** Max. Weekends Off can only be achieved with certain patterns
Are you thoroughly confused? Sorry. There's a lot of information in this chart. Let me try to explain using 5-person coverage as an example. There are 2 rows with 5-person coverage. On the first row, 7 people are required if they work an average of 40 hours a week. On the second line, 8 people are required, but they only have to work an average of 35 hours a week.
Why would you adopt a schedule that only averages 35 hours a week? People do it all the time. Not because they want fewer hours. They chose a popular work pattern without realizing that it averages less than 40 hours. In this case, the pattern is 5 days of work followed by 3 days off, aka 5-on-3-off.
Continuing with the example, you'll next see the maximum weekends off. The maximum with 7 people per shift is 2 weekends off every 7 weeks whereas the max. with 8 people per shift is 3 weekends off every 8 weeks. After that is a tally of the number of possible schedules along with descriptions of those schedules. Max. 7 days means the schedule requires working 7 consecutive days at some point. In general, the more days worked, the more weekends off.
A significant portion of my clients contact me because they have adopted a popular 8-hour work pattern, and they're tired of the employee complaints and never having enough or consistent coverage. I try to show them both alternative approaches (i.e. different shift lengths) and other 8-hour options. This way they can compare the coverage, average hours of work, weekends off, and so on. This chart illustrates the possibilities for 8-hour fixed shifts only.
Are you ready to explore other work patterns or alternative scheduling approaches? Contact us today:
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