subject: Managing The Problems Surrounding The Night Shift [print this page] Many businesses have a night shift which means that they are able to offer a service around the clock or that they are able to keep manufacturing goods twenty-four hours a day. A night shift is a good move for manufacturers because it reduces the need for expensive equipment being left idle overnight. It is also the case now that there are many services that customers expect to be available at all hours and the numbers of such services are on the increase; for example customers now want to be able to do their supermarket shopping around the clock. There will also be certain services, such as nursing, where a night shift is a must.
Scheduling staff for a night shift can be a problem for some businesses; this shift can be unpopular with some employees. There are different ways of dealing with this issue. You may decide that you will have permanent night shift members of staff who will only ever do nights or you might decide that all your staff should take turns doing them and use a rotating shift system. There are pros can cons with each of these solutions and the final choice will depend on the demands of your business and your staff.
It is always a good idea to involve the employees in any decisions about how you are going to staff the night shift. This way there will be fewer reasons for contention, and at least some of the staff will get a system that they are happy with. It can often occur that when members of staff are allowed to make suggestions about how they would like to work they can be really imaginative, and provide ideas that are effective.
If you are going to be having a system where staff will be rotating to the night shift you will need to ensure that they have a few days of in-between. The change from working nights to working days is a shock to the body and it takes a few days to adjust. This will also mean that staff should not be moving from days to nights more than once a month. If you have a permanent night shift team this will be less of an issue.
It is often the case the employees on the permanent night shift get left out when it comes to staff training. Efforts should be made to ensure that this does not happen and that the night staff members are kept up to date. One way of dealing with this is to appoint a member of the night shift staff to be responsible for staff training. There will be some training that will be only available during the day, but it is probably not a good idea to be frequently demanding the night staff to attend these when they should be sleeping. It is also important that efforts are mad to ensure that any permanent night staff members as made to feel part of the overall team and not view themselves as a separate fiefdom.
by: Ryan Fyfe
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