6-day schedules (part 1)
Sometimes companies are born into a 24/7 schedule. An example would be a refinery. From the moment it was conceived until it reached operational retirement, it was a 24/7 operation. There are many examples like this. More often than not, 24/7 schedules are something that companies grow into. They start off covering one or two … Continue reading “6-day schedules (part 1)”
Overtime: Fact V. Fiction
It is not unusual for a company to contact us with the following idea: “If I can just put in the right schedule, I will save a ton of money on overtime.” There is really just one condition where this is absolutely true. If your current schedule has too many people at one part of … Continue reading “Overtime: Fact V. Fiction”
A Few Words About Overtime
How to Engage our Services
There is a book by Malcolm Gladwell called Blink, the Power of Thinking Without Thinking. In a nutshell, he talks about how too much information is not always a good thing. We often make better choices with less information rather than more. I sometimes worry that our site offers too much. We really want visitors … Continue reading “How to Engage our Services”
Covering a 12-hour Vacancy
There is no doubt that shift workers prefer 12-hour shifts over 8-hour shifts. It’s not that they like being at work for an extra four hours. They like the additional 91 days off a year. Therein lies the problem. With so many days off, it seems that the crew you need to get in touch … Continue reading “Covering a 12-hour Vacancy”
Making Shift Assignments
It’s human nature to not like change. There are a lot of reasons for this, among the biggest is the fear of the unknown. People “know” what’s going on now. They “know” how things work. Anything different is unknown. A schedule change is probably the biggest change your workforce will go through in a generation. … Continue reading “Making Shift Assignments”
Draft Day – Assigning shifts on Your New Schedule
As supervisors and managers go through a process to change the shift schedule, the workforce will experience several different emotions; mostly in a predictable sequence. First, there will be a surprise, fear or even anger as the news breaks – “We are going to move to a 24/7 schedule.” Depending on your project’s process, the … Continue reading “Draft Day – Assigning shifts on Your New Schedule”
The Cost of Time
Suppose I asked you the following question: “Will an employee make more or less money when they work overtime?” You might quickly answer: “Yes. They make anywhere from 50% to 100% more when they are being paid at the overtime rate.” And you would be right. Now, suppose I asked you, “Which costs you, the … Continue reading “The Cost of Time”
Use Your Data — Know Your Business
Over the last 30 years, I have evaluated the operations of hundreds of manufacturing, processing, mining, and service organizations. Three things I have learned from that work: Companies know their business, but their knowledge is incomplete. They shoot targets, monitor KPIs, and compare their performance to their plans and budgets. But they don’t have time … Continue reading “Use Your Data — Know Your Business”
Help is on the way.
There is no such thing as a perfectly staffed shiftwork operation. Sure, there will be days when the number of people that show up is exactly the number of people that you need. It happens, but not often enough. What does a typical day or week really look like? The workload varies. This could be … Continue reading “Help is on the way.”