This case study is about a guy who had 7 employees and needed to cover 24/7 using 12-hour fixed shifts. So far, everything's fine. But then he said he wanted no overtime and didn't care about the coverage. He just wanted to see a work pattern. When I asked him for more information about his workload and absence rate in an email, he never replied. Too bad.

I'll begin my comments with the coverage. I believe coverage requirements are the starting point for all schedule design efforts. If you don't care what the coverage is, why have a schedule? Somewhere along the line, people seem to have forgotten that the purpose of a schedule is to deploy your staff as effectively as possible. I think people have gotten so wrapped up in comparing different on-off work patterns that they lost sight of the fundamental objective of the schedule.

If all you care about is the shift length and schedule format (fixed or rotating shifts), you're going to use your staff ineffectively. You won't match coverage with the workload. You may be overstaffed and incurring costs unnecessarily. If I knew more about  this group's situation, I might recommend something else. For example, if they had a busy period every day from 3 p.m. to 9 p.m., I might recommend 10-hour shifts. If they had a high absence rate, I might recommend rotating shifts and devoting some time in the schedule to relief coverage. Unfortunately, he never mentioned any of those things.

Let's turn to the overtime. I can't tell you how many times I've heard people say, "We don't want any overtime in our schedule!" I try to explain that they will save money and get a better schedule, but they won't listen. Look, overtime is merely a substitute for staff. And a little bit of OT in the schedule goes a long way. Most 24/7 schedules average 42 hours a week. To avoid those 2 hours of overtime, the group will have to hire more staff. The amount depends on the size of the group, the number of job titles, and the type of schedule. In every situation I've seen, the cost of the extra staff is way more than cost of the built-in overtime, especially when you factor in the cost of benefits (holidays, vacations, 401Ks, insurance, pensions, etc.). You can read the page on my website regarding this topic at http://www.shift-schedule-design.com/Overtime_Issues.

If all you care about is the work pattern, check the Internet for free schedule examples or templates. But if you want a schedule that makes the most effective and efficient use of your staff, you need to focus on your group's workload distribution and the associated coverage requirements. Once you've figured out what that requires, you can then look for alternative work patterns and ways to increase weekends off.