What is a better schedule anyway?

 

Ask employees, and some will tell you, "10-hour shifts from Mon-Thu." Others may say, "12-hour fixed shifts with every other weekend off." The common themes are the preferred shift length and format (fixed shifts vs. rotating shifts).

 

Ask managers, and some will say, "We need more coverage on the 2nd shift because that's the busiest part of the day." Others will say, "We need to hire more staff, but upper management has a lid on hiring" or "Overtime is killing us, so we need a schedule that will reduce it." The common themes with this group are coverage and costs.

 

Unfortunately, the best solutions for employees probably will not produce the best results for managers. For example, 10-hour shifts in 24/7 operations require at least 25% more staff than 8 or 12-hour shifts. And fixed shifts can increase the staffing requirements even further. Ouch! Some of the scheduling preferences just aren't feasible, and some may compromise the organization's mission.

 

Most organizations simply can't afford to adopt the types of schedules that employees wish they had. So the question becomes, will the best solutions for managers produce good results for employees? I believe they can. Employees won't get their fantasy schedule, but they will get an attractive pattern with good breaks and maximum possible weekends off.

 

Here is how I define the "best" shift schedules. They should address three goals: (1) optimize coverage, (2) minimize costs, and (3) maximize employee satisfaction. These goals are in priority order. In other words, when designing a schedule, you should start with the coverage allocation, then work on keeping costs down, and finally on what makes employees happy. Reversing this order can wreak havoc on the organization. Here's another article that explains this in much greater detail:  https://www.shift-schedule-design.com/Shift_Schedule_Design_for_Dummies. 

One of the key issues with 12-hour shift schedules is how to cover absences. With 8-hour shifts, one way to cover absences is to hold an employee on the previous shift over so that he or she works two consecutive shifts or 16 hours total. Another way is to split the vacant shift into two 4-hour segments, and have someone from the previous shift stay over for 4 additional hours and have someone from the following shift come in 4 hours early. It's fairly easy to cover the open shift this way, since the replacements are already at work or planning to work later that same day.
 

Unfortunately, 12-hour shifts are too long for either of these approaches. Holding someone over for a second shift means they would be working 24 hours (36 hours if they are scheduled to work the next day too). With a split shift, it means the replacements would be working 18 hours straight. Clearly this is excessive.
 

With 12-hour shifts, the only option is to find a qualified employee who is not scheduled to work the same day as the absence. Sounds simple, right? Well it's not. Supervisors can spend an inordinate amount of time trying to find volunteers. It can be tough to reach people. Candidates may have left town or they may be too busy to answer the phone. And they simply may not want to work that day. They might have made other plans or don't want to spoil a nice multi-day break.
 

This is one case in which scheduling software can be beneficial for the supervisors. You'll want a program that makes it easy to both identify eligible candidates and then to contact them. Eligibility may include things like: (1) job title, (2) skill sets, (3) work schedule, and (4) recent overtime hours (to prevent over-using someone). Contact can be by email or text message. If no one volunteers within a fixed amount of time, the supervisor can select someone to cover the open position using criteria such as reverse seniority. All of this saves the supervisor a huge amount of time, freeing them up to focus on other responsibilities.

Over the past couple of weeks, I've had requests from several managers of small groups (5 or 6 people) for help in finding a 24/7 schedule. In most cases, the groups consisted of supervisors rather than workers. They wanted 8, 10 or 12-hour shifts, and they were open to either fixed shifts or rotating shifts.

 

The managers wanted to see what the different options looked like so they could choose the one that appealled to the most people. I explained that this was not the best way to search for a schedule. The starting point should always be the business requirements. You want to make sure there is adequate coverage and that it matches the workload. You also want to use the resources (staff and overtime) efficiently. Schedule attractiveness can only be pursued after the business requirements are satisfied.

 

If I assume that these groups needed 1-person coverage on a 24/7 basis, this is what they would see with the six different combinations of shift length and format (fixed vs. rotating shifts):

8-hour Rotating Shifts

1-person coverage requires 4 people working an average of 42 hours a week. With a staff of 5 or 6, they would have 1 or 2 "extra" employees. This extra capacity could be used to increase the coverage, reduce the average hours of work, or to build relief coverage into the schedule to cover absences. The biggest downside is that the schedules are miserable for the employees.

8-hour Fixed Shifts

1-person coverage requires 6 people working 40 hours a week (2 people per shift). There would be 3 days a week in which both employees on a shift would be working, so this is something to keep in mind if there isn't enough room for 2 people at the same time. There would be no extra capacity with this type of schedule. Although not as efficient as 8-hour rotating shifts, they are a little better for employees.

10-hour Rotating Shifts

10-hour shifts always require the most personnel because the group is working 30 hours a day (three 10-hour shifts). I only recommend using 10-hour shifts if the group can take advantage of the 6 hours of overlapping shifts that could be matched to the group's busiest time of the day. 1-person coverage requires at least 5 people working an average of 42 hours a week. If there were 6 employees, this would leave 1 extra. This extra person could be used to increase the coverage on one shift or to build relief coverage into the schedule to cover absences. Even though employees get one more day off each week (as compared to 8-hour schedules), the work patterns aren't that attractive, i.e. quick rotations and lots of 1 or 2-day breaks.

 

10-hour Fixed Shifts

1-person coverage requires at least 6 people working 40 hours a week (2 people per shift). There would be 1 day a week in which both employees on a shift would be working. During the 6 hours of overlapping shifts on the overlapping day, there would be 4 people at work. If this exceeds the physical capacity of the site, this would not be a good choice. As with fixed 8-hour shifts, there would be no extra capacity.

 

12-hour Fixed or Rotating Shifts

1-person coverage requires only 4 people working an average of 42 hours a week. With a staff of 5 or 6, they would have 1 or 2 "extra" employees (the same as 8-hour rotating shifts). This extra capacity could be used to either increase the coverage, reduce the average hours of work, or to build relief coverage into the schedule to cover absences. Despite the long days of work, most employees prefer these patterns since they offer twice as many days off and up to half the weekends off.

 

Summary

Rather than looking for examples of every possible combination of shift length and format (fixed vs. rotating shifts), these groups should first decide what is most important to them:

• Increased coverage. Does the group need more than 1-person coverage for part of the day or during certain days of the week? If so, the desired coverage levels should be the starting point of the schedule search since several options (as pointed out above) have no extra capacity to increase the coverage with.
  
  
• Reduced work hours. Some groups avoid overtime like the plague. They will do anything (including hiring one or two extra staff) so they never have to work more than 40 hours a week. Even though I have argued repeatedly that this is not the best financial approach, many organizations still think the schedule should never have overtime in it.
   
• Relief coverage. If increased coverage isn't needed, any extra capacity can be used to create relief coverage, i.e. time in the schedule available to cover absences. This will reduce the need to cover absences with overtime. Relief coverage works best with rotating shifts since it can be used to cover absences on any shift. With fixed shifts, you would need to build relief coverage into each shift's schedule, so it will require more staff.

Once the priorities are clear, this will narrow down the feasible approaches. There are too many possibilities to discuss here, so if you need more help, please let me know.

When managers explain why they're searching for a new shift schedule, it usually boils down to one of these three reasons:

 

 

Resource Changes

Either the staff size or the group's budget is changing. If the group is getting bigger, there may be opportunities to use the extra capacity to reduce the average weekly hours, boost coverage on one or more shifts, or build relief coverage into the schedule to cover some of the absences. If the group is getting smaller, the average weekly hours of work may have to be increased to maintain the minimum coverage requirements.

 

Sometimes upper management wants to cut costs but not change the headcount. The group will have to do a cost analysis of overtime in the schedule vs. overtime outside the schedule to determine the best approach. You can read about this here:  http://www.shift-schedule-design.com/Overtime_Issues. The group may also be forced to consider other schedule changes that will lower costs as discussed here:  http://www.shift-schedule-design.com/Cost_Reduction.

 

 

New Business Requirements

When the demand for an organization's products or services changes (usually by increasing), this may require them to hire more employees or make more effective use of their current employees. In either case, it's a good time to align the coverage with the workload. We start the schedule design process by evaluating work volumes and the associated coverage requirements by time of day and day of the week. We also consider absence coverage if the resources are adequate.

 

 

Employee Satisfaction

When employees search for a new schedule, they are primarily looking for ways to increase the days off and weekends off. When managers cite employee satisfaction as a reason for changing schedules, they hope that the change will reduce absenteeism and employee turnover, or improve productivity and morale issues. Once business requirements are satisfied, we will evaluate solutions that maximize days off and weekends off and, if possible, reduce the need for mandatory overtime.

 

 

 

 

Wikipedia defines para-transit as follows:

"Para-transit is recognized in North America as special transportation services for people with disabilities, often provided as a supplement to fixed-route bus and rail systems by public transit agencies. Para-transit services may vary considerably on the degree of flexibility they provide their customers. At their simplest they may consist of a taxi or small bus that will run along a more or less defined route and then stop to pick up or discharge passengers on request. At the other end of the spectrum—fully demand-responsive transport - the most flexible para-transit systems offer on-demand call-up door-to-door service from any origin to any destination in a service area. In addition to public transit agencies, paratransit services are operated by community groups or not-for-profit organizations, and for-profit private companies or operators."

Because the demand for para-transit services is so highly variable, scheduling the drivers is a challenging task. Most para-transit organizations tend to rely on overtime and a large pool of drivers that can be called into work when needed. I believe there is huge opportunity to schedule the drivers more effectively and reduce the costs. This opportunity comes from two key points. The first point is that historical trip volumes can and should be used to develop a schedule. The second point is that relief coverage is the best way to accommodate both employee absences and deviations from historical average trip volumes. Let's take a closer look at the specific steps involved.

Step #1: Historical Trip Volumes

The first step is to determine the workload distribution throughout the hours of operation. Start by categorizing the trip data into 2 or 3 groups based on the time involved. For example, Category A consists of trips that last 30 minutes or less. Category B consists of trips that last 30 to 60 minutes. Category C consists of trips that last more than 60 minutes.

Then look through the past year's historical data of trips made during every 30 minutes of the hours of operation. So if the first trip of the day begins at 6 a.m., I would calculate the average number of trips in each category between 6:00 a.m. and 6:30 a.m. Then I would do the same for 6:30 a.m. to 7:00 a.m., 7:00 a.m. to 7:30 a.m., and so on. I would put these averages into a summary table.

If you have the data (and the time), you could also determine the maximum number of trips that occurred during each 30-minute period and add this data to the summary table. You also could create separate tables for each region in the service area and for each season of the year.

Step #2: Driver Requirements

The second step is to determine the coverage requirements. The number of drivers needed during each 30-minute period depends on the type of service the organization offers. If the service is door-to-door, you will need one driver for each trip. If the service is limited to fixed routes, you will need fewer drivers per trip. The point is that you will need to translate the trip volumes into driver requirements by time of day. In scheduling jargon, this is called establishing the coverage requirements. Once these figures are made available, a scheduling expert can help with the remaining steps. I say this because the next few steps are the most difficult part of the process.

Step #3:  Schedule Framework

This step will determine the shift lengths, start times, and number of drivers needed on each shift.  This is basically a trial and error process. Here is a simple example:

Time Period       Drivers Needed

0600 to 0700                       5

0700 to  0900                      6

0900 to 1300                       8

1300 to 1500                       7

1500 to 1800                       5

You begin with the first time period of the day (0600 to 0700). 5 drivers are needed on this first shift. You can test the three standard shift lengths: 8-hour, 10-hour and 12-hour shifts according to how well they fit with the afternoon requirements. If we use a 12-hour shift, this will means 5 drivers will be working from 0600 to 1800. This matches the coverage needed from 1500 to 1800, so that would be the best choice. For most organizations, it's never this simple and compromises (e.g., over-staffing for part of the day) are likely to be necessary.

6 drivers are needed during the second period (0700 to 0900). We therefore will need 1 driver on this second shift (since we already have 5 people at work from the first shift of the day). Again we will test the three standard shift lengths for the impact on the afternoon. The best choice would be an 8-hour shift since anything longer would unnecessarily boost the coverage after 3 p.m. when it isn't needed.

We continue this process, sometimes going back to the beginning and changing earlier choices to make the entire framework more efficient, i.e. no understaffing and minimal overstaffing. The framework I would choose is as follows:

Shift Length       Drivers                 Time Covered

12                             5                         0600 to 1800

 8                              1                         0700 to 1500

 4                              2                         0900 to 1300

If part-time drivers are not allowed in an organization, I would choose the following framework:

Shift Length       Drivers                 Time Covered

12                             5                          0600 to 1500

8                               3                          0700 to 1500

Step #4:  Basic Staffing Requirements                                                                                                                                   

Now that we know the shift lengths and coverage requirements, we can determine the number of drivers needed to produce the coverage requirements. The 12-hour shift will require 10 drivers to produce 5 drivers every day of the week. The 10 drivers will all work an average of 42 hours a week. The 8-hour shift will require 2 drivers to produce 1 driver every day of the week. They will average 40 hours a week and there will be 3 days a week in which both drivers must be scheduled to work (to ensure 40-hour work weeks). If you can use part-time drivers, you can avoid the days of overlap. The 4-hour shift will require as many part-time drivers as you want.

Step #5:  Supplemental Staffing Requirements                                                                                                                

In the previous step, we focused on the staff needed just for the coverage requirements. But remember, the coverage is based on the average number of trips, not the peak demand. Also, drivers get sick, take vacation, or change jobs. That means we need some extra staff to allow for this. If we assume a 10% absence rate and another 30% difference between the peak demand and average demand, we need a 40% relief allowance.

In addition to the extra staff needed for relief coverage, some of the shifts will need extra personnel to simplify the schedule design. Here's a summary of the staff needed for each shift:

Shift                      Basic Staff           Relief Staff           Extras                 Total Staff

0600 to 1800               10                            4                        1                             15

0700 to 1500                 2                            1                        0                               3

0900 to 1300                 2                             1                       1                               4

Step #6: Schedule Design

For the 12-hour shift, we will create a 3-crew schedule (5 drivers per crew) that averages 42 hours a week. For the 8-hour shift, we will create a 3-crew schedule (1 driver per crew) that averages 40 hours a week. For the 4-hour shift, we will create a schedule that averages 20 hours a week. We will use the staff on this part-time shift as trainees and reserves for full-time employees that decide to change jobs.

Here is an example of a schedule for the 12-hour shift:

Crew/Week       Sun        Mon      Tue        Wed      Thu        Fri           Sat          Hours

A / Week 1            -            12         12             -            -           12            12             48

B / Week 2          12             -            -            12         12           -               R             36

C / Week 3          R              R          R            R           R            R             -               42

The three crews of 5 employees are assigned to one of the 3 weeks in the cycle. Crew A is assigned to start in week 1, Crew B is assigned to start in week 2 and Crew C is assigned to start in week 3. At the end of each week, the crews move to the next week of the cycle: Crew A moves to week 2, B moves to week 3, and C moves up to week 1. They continue to move through the 3-week cycle. All three crews are working the same 3-week schedule. They are merely in different weeks of the 3-week pattern.

R is a relief shift which means the crew is on-call for the entire 7 days shown. If someone from week 1 or week 2 is scheduled for vacation, an employee on relief will simply work the vacationer's schedule that week. If no one is absent, the employees on relief can be called in for a couple of hours to satisfy a temporary increase in demand. The organization should establish rules on the priorities for relief work and limits on the hours and number of days worked during the 7-day period.

Here is an example of a schedule for the 8-hour shift:

Emp / Week       Sun        Mon      Tue        Wed      Thu        Fri           Sat          Hours

A / Week 1            -               -           8             8           8            8              8               40

B / Week 2            8              8           -             -            R            R             R              40

C / Week 3            R             R          R            R           R            -              -                40

Conclusions

We've demonstrated how assembling historical data on trip volumes can be used as the foundation for scheduling transit drivers. We also illustrated how to build extra capacity into the schedule to cover absences/vacancies and temporary fluctuations in demand. The key point is that schedules for variable workloads are ideally based on actual data rather than gut feelings, intuition, overtime considerations, etc. Using a full-time scheduling person that spends the day on the phone trying to get drivers to come to work is not the most efficient or effective approach when it comes to scheduling para-transit drivers. So if you want to keep service levels high and costs low, see if we can make this new scheduling process work for you.

Most organizations cannot eliminate ALL of the overtime without sacrificing production or service levels. There are three situations in which overtime is going to be necessary: (1) the work volume temporarily increases, (2) a position is vacant, or (3) someone is absent (vacation, illness, training, etc.). I refer to this as overtime incurred outside the normal work schedule.

Sometimes it's possible to reduce overtime by swapping where it occurs. If you increase the overtime within the regular work schedule (e.g., by increasing the average hours of work from 40 to 42 per week), it may be possible to reduce the need for overtime outside the schedule. In some cases, the total overtime will be reduced.

I know, you're going to argue that overtime should be given to those employees who want it the most and volunteer for it. That's fine - up to a point. But when the overtime becomes excessive or when it continues so long that employees become addicted to it, then it's a problem. Or when you run out of volunteers and have to rely on mandatory, forced overtime to achieve or maintain the desired coverage levels - that's not good.

Here are two examples that illustrate the benefits of increasing overtime in the schedule to reduce overtime that occurs outside the schedule.

Example #1
A police department needs two people working at all times on a 24/7 basis. They are using 9 officers with an 8-hour rotating shift schedule because they don't want any overtime in the schedule. The problem is, like most law enforcement agencies, they have a high absence rate which causes their overtime to bust the budget.

If they built a small amount of overtime into the schedule, they could free up enough capacity to have a full week of relief coverage. They would need a 9-week schedule in which 8 weeks were devoted to the required coverage and 1 week was devoted to relief coverage. All 9 employees would share the relief responsibility equally. With rotating shifts, this relief coverage could be used to cover absences on any shift. It doesn't mean the relief employee would work all week; it simply means they are on-call for that week. If someone was scheduled for vacation, the relief person would work the vacationer's schedule that week and nothing more. If no one took vacation, the relief person could work a Mon-Fri day shift or go to training or work on a special project.

So the tradeoff is 2 hours of overtime for all 9 employees every week (18 hours of total overtime) in exchange for the flexibility to cover 40 to 48 hours of absences a week. Granted, someone won't be on vacation every week, but isn't it compelling to use 18 hours of OT in the schedule to avoid an average of 42 hours of OT outside the schedule? And think of the time saved trying to find volunteers to cover any absences, or the aggravation of forcing a junior employee to do a couple of double shifts when no one else volunteers.

Example #2
This example comes from a company that I designed schedules for earlier this week. They have 8 employees and need 2-person coverage at all times on a 24/7 basis. This would be simple if the 8 employees worked an average of 42 hours a week. The problem was that upper management would not approve a schedule with overtime in it. So I created three schedule options using a combination of 12-hour and 4-hour shifts. The 8 employees will have to work three 12-hour shifts and one 4-hour shift or 40 hours every week.

Although the schedules had no overtime in them, there were two 8 hour periods with only 1-person coverage instead of the desired 2-person coverage. The good news is that the organization had three supervisors to fill these open slots. The bad news is that the supervisors already had a tough time trying to be available on a 24/7 basis. When you added the two extra shifts plus relief coverage for all the other absences including their own, the supervisors were working way too many hours a week and were burned out.

I recommended that the client hire one more employee and have the 9 employees work a 12-hour schedule that averaged 42 hours a week. This would have allowed them to build a full week of relief coverage into the schedule. There would be no coverage gaps and a lot less need for OT to cover absences. I was unable to convince them that was the best solution. And believe me, I gave it my best shot. I'll probably hear from them again when the supervisors start bailing out for more attractive work environments with other employers. It's too bad that management's desire to avoid overtime in the employee's schedule is ruining the job for the supervisors. Replacing those supervisors is going to be a lot more expensive and painful.

Higher-ranking law enforcement personnel (e.g., Police Chiefs, Sheriffs, Captains, and Lieutenants) tend to look at 10-hour shifts in a different way than their subordinates do. They are well aware of the popularity of 10-hour shifts among the officers/deputies, but often are unable to adopt them due to resource constraints. Let's look at the major considerations in the change to 10-hour shifts from the management perspective.

Overtime

Since four 10-hour shifts add up to 40 hours a week, some people believe 10-hour shifts will eliminate overtime from the work schedule. Unfortunately, this is not always the case as shown below:

24/7 Coverage	Crews Needed	Schedule Format	Average Workweek
1 crew	5	Rotating shifts	42
1 crew	6	Fixed shifts	40
2 crews	5	Rotating shifts	42
3 crews	15	Either	42
4 crews	21	Either	40

 

A crew can consist of one to hundreds of officers. Unlike many 8 or 12-hour shift schedules that require 4 crews, 10-hour schedules require 5 or more crews. For example, to have 1-person coverage around-the-clock, you need 5 people if you use rotating shifts and 6 people if you use fixed shifts. To have 2-person coverage, you would need 10 people (5 crews of 2 each) with rotating shifts and 12 people (6 crews of 2 each) with fixed shifts.

The most common 10-hour schedules rely on 5 or 15 crews. These schedules average 42 hours a week, the same as most 8-hour and 12-hour schedules that use 4 crews. I occasionally get calls from Police Captains and Lieutenants who have tried to create a schedule on their own, but can't make it work. They didn't realize that the schedule needed an occasional 50-hour work week or that it required more crews. Overtime is unnecessary only when the schedule is comprised of 6 crews or 21 crews (and sometimes with a crewless schedule).

 

Overlapping Shifts

A schedule that uses three 10-hour shifts will have 6 hours a day in which the shifts overlap one another. There are two common ways to use the overlaps:

• Overlap each shift by two hours. Officers on the out-going shift can do their paperwork while officers on the in-coming shift are out on the street. This ensures continued coverage throughout the day. This approach tends to be preferred by the officers.
  
  
• Align the overlapping shifts with the busiest period of the day. Coverage can be boosted for 6, 12 or 16 hours a day depending on how the shifts are scheduled. I recommend this approach because the primary reason for having a schedule is to allocate the resources to match the workload. The downside is that it often requires unusual shift start/end times. This approach tends to be preferred by management.

Coverage Reduction

The biggest problem with 10-hour shifts is that they require more resources than 8-hour or 12-hour shifts. A 10-hour schedule requires more staff because the officers are working 30 hours a day (three 10-hour shifts). This will either require 25% more personnel or a 25% reduction in the coverage levels. In most cases, headcounts are frozen, so the impact is reduced coverage on each shift.

Even if sufficient staff is available, they are usually needed for other purposes such as absence coverage. Since the absence rates in most police departments are rather high, most Chiefs opt to use any “extra” staff in one of two ways:

• Increase coverage levels above the minimum. For example, a department needs a minimum of 3 officers on each shift. This requires at least 12 officers working an average of 42 hours a week. They use their staff of 16 officers to provide 4-person coverage. This allows for up to one absence on each shift.
  
  
• Build relief coverage into the schedule. This is often more efficient than increasing the coverage on each shift. For example, the same department only has 14 officers, so they adopt a 14-week rotating shift schedule in which 2 of the 14 weeks are devoted to relief coverage. This requires fewer staff and provides more flexible absence coverage.

When the "extra" coverage is lost, absences (like vacations, sick time, training, court time, etc.) will have to be covered using overtime. This is the most common reason for rejecting the switch to 10-hour shifts. This is such an important point that I have to repeat it. Adopting 10-hour shifts will reduce the coverage on each shift (except for the periods of overlapping shifts). Since part of this coverage provides a cushion for absences, the 10-hour shifts will result in much higher levels of overtime.

 

Absences

Some people believe that 10-hour shifts will reduce absences. Since the longer shifts provide one additional day off each week, this time can be used for doctor's appointments or other personal business. I am not aware of any studies that confirm this, but it seems possible. The Shift Length Experiment prepared by the Police Foundation did not report any significant reductions in sick leave when switching to 10s (http://www.policefoundation.org/publication/shift-length-experiment/). If there is an impact, it is undoubtedly small. 

 

Conclusions

10-hour shifts are universally popular with the officers. Chiefs or Sheriffs are aware of this, but lack of resources to make the change. From what I've seen, it's primarily the larger departments that have adequate resources to adopt 10s. Smaller departments (less than 30 officers) rarely have enough personnel. 

Higher-ranking law enforcement personnel (e.g., Police Chiefs, Sheriffs, Captains, and Lieutenants) tend to look at 10-hour shifts in a different way than their subordinates do. They are well aware of the popularity of 10-hour shifts among the officers/deputies, but often are unable to adopt them due to resource constraints. Let's look at the major considerations in the change to 10-hour shifts from the management perspective.

Overtime

Since four 10-hour shifts add up to 40 hours a week, some people believe 10-hour shifts will eliminate overtime from the work schedule. Unfortunately, this is not always the case as shown below:

Coverage	Crews	Schedule Format	Average Workweek
1 crew	5	Rotating shifts	42
1 crew	6	Fixed shifts	40
2 crews	5	Rotating shifts	42
3 crews	15	Either	42
4 crews	21	Either	40

 

A crew can consist of one to hundreds of officers. Unlike many 8 or 12-hour shift schedules that require 4 crews, 10-hour schedules require 5 or more crews. For example, to have 1-person coverage around-the-clock, you need 5 people if you use rotating shifts and 6 people if you use fixed shifts. To have 2-person coverage, you would need 10 people (5 crews of 2 each) with rotating shifts and 12 people (6 crews of 2 each) with fixed shifts.

The most common 10-hour schedules rely on 5 or 15 crews. These schedules average 42 hours a week, the same as most 8-hour and 12-hour schedules that use 4 crews. I occasionally get calls from Police Captains and Lieutenants who have tried to create a schedule on their own, but can't make it work. They didn't realize that the schedule needed an occasional 50-hour work week or that it required more crews. Overtime is unnecessary only when the schedule is comprised of 6 crews or 21 crews (and sometimes with a crewless schedule).

 

Overlapping Shifts

A schedule that uses three 10-hour shifts will have 6 hours a day in which the shifts overlap one another, producing double coverage. There are two common ways to use the overlaps:

• Overlap each shift by two hours. Officers on the out-going shift can do their paperwork while officers on the in-coming shift are out on the street. This ensures continued coverage throughout the day. This approach tends to be preferred by the officers.
  
  
• Align the overlapping shifts with the busiest period of the day. Coverage can be boosted for 6, 12 or 16 hours a day depending on how the shifts are scheduled. I recommend this approach because the primary reason for having a schedule is to allocate the resources to match the workload. The downside is that it often requires unusual shift start/end times. This approach tends to be preferred by management.

Coverage Reduction

The biggest problem with 10-hour shifts is that they require more resources than 8-hour or 12-hour shifts. A 10-hour schedule requires more staff because the officers are really covering 30 hours a day (three 10-hour shifts). This will either require 25% more personnel or a 25% reduction in the coverage levels. In most cases, headcounts are frozen, so the impact is reduced coverage on each shift.

Even if sufficient staff is available, they are usually needed for other purposes such as absence coverage. Since the absence rates in most police departments are rather high, most Chiefs opt to use any “extra” staff in one of two ways:

• Increase coverage levels above the minimum. For example, a department needs 3 officers on each shift. This requires at least 12 officers working an average of 42 hours a week. They use their staff of 16 officers to provide 4-person coverage. This allows for up to one absence on each shift.
  
  
• Build relief coverage into the schedule. This is often more efficient than increasing the coverage on each shift. For example, the same department only has 14 officers, so they adopt a 14-week rotating shift schedule in which 2 of the 14 weeks are devoted to relief coverage. This requires fewer staff and provides more flexible absence coverage.

When the "extra" coverage is lost, absences (like vacations, sick time, training, court time, etc.) will have to be covered using overtime. This is the most common reason for rejecting the switch to 10-hour shifts. This is such an important point that I have to repeat it. Adopting 10-hour shifts will reduce the coverage on each shift (except for the periods of overlapping shifts). Since part of this coverage provides a cushion for absences, the 10-hour shifts will result in much higher levels of overtime.

 

Absences

Some people believe that 10-hour shifts will reduce absences. Since the longer shifts provide one additional day off each week, this time can be used for doctor's appointments or other personal business. I am not aware of any studies that confirm this, but it seems possible. The Shift Length Experiment prepared by the Police Foundation did not report any significant reductions in sick leave when switching to 10s (http://www.policefoundation.org/publication/shift-length-experiment/). If there is an impact, it is undoubtedly small. 

 

Conclusions

10-hour shifts are universally popular with the officers. Chiefs or Sheriffs are aware of this, but often lack adequate resources to make the change. The simple fact that 10-hour shifts require at least 25% more staff than other approaches means that few departments can afford them. From what I've seen, it's primarily the larger departments that have adequate resources to adopt 10s. Smaller departments (less than 30 officers) rarely have enough personnel. 

What is the best way to handle absences? Everybody seems to have a different take on this. Let's look at the four most common approaches:

Part-Time Employees
In smaller organizations, this can be a great solution. It's cheaper than overtime, and it doesn't place a huge burden on the full-time staff. The problem is finding and retaining good part-time employees. It is usually best for jobs that don't require extensive training or specialized skill sets. The exceptions to this are nursing and on-demand transit, as many organizations in these fields are able to find a large pool of candidates seeking part-time employment.

Overtime
The most efficient way to cover absences is by using overtime. Your existing staff is trained and readily available. Best of all, you only pay for the coverage when it is needed. On 8-hour shifts, you can split the vacant shift into two 4-hour sessions. Hold someone from the prior shift over for the first session and call someone from the following shift in early to work the second 4-hour session. 10-hour and 12-hour shifts are different. With them, you should call someone into work who is scheduled to be off. Most groups seek volunteers first before resorting to mandatory call-ins of the least tenured staff. If the overtime levels exceed 15% of the normal working hours on a regular basis, however, that is too high and you probably should hire more staff.

Relief Coverage
Time can be built into the work schedule for relief coverage. For example, if you need eight employees to provide the basic coverage, you could employ one extra person. You would then create a 9-week schedule for the group in which one of the 9 weeks is devoted entirely to relief coverage. Since all 9 people rotate through this 9-week schedule, they would equally share in the responsibility. This works best with rotating shift schedules since the relief person can cover any shift. Larger organizations often do this by adding a fifth crew. The extra capacity could be used for both relief coverage and training purposes.

Additional Staff
This is the most expensive approach since you would pay for the extra employees even when they are not needed. For example, if you needed 4-person coverage at all times, you might hire enough staff to have 5-person coverage. Many law enforcement agencies use this approach because it is critical to maintain a minimum level of coverage. They also tend to have rather high absence rates.

 
Each of these approaches has its own advantages and disadvantages. They are listed here in order of cost (from lowest to highest), so I would probably start at the top and test each approach until you find the best one for your unique situation and requirements.