Managing Shiftwork
Authors: Wagner Jon A. 
Published: January 2009

As our culture increasingly depends on round-the-clock operations to provide necessary services and efficiently utilize productive capacities, more and more people are required to work shiftwork. Shiftwork, as experienced in this country, normally includes work during hours of darkness and work on weekends. Often, this round-the-clock coverage requires workers to “rotate” through three shifts (day, afternoon, and night), or to work a steady run of afternoon or night shifts. Previous research has linked shiftwork with disruptions of family life, health, sleep, safety, and productivity, in a variety of work situations. In addition, a poorly designed work schedule can adversely affect job satisfaction, employee turnover, and absenteeism. Given these facts, managers need to be made more aware of these often hidden challenges facing them and their workers. The way to meet these challenges is with research, education, and implementation of improved methods of scheduling and handling the management of shiftworkers. Such experimental improvements have already paid benefits both on and off the job for workers in some continuous operations.

The successful management of shiftwork can involve many of the following approaches: 1) selecting workers who are biologically and psychologically adept at handling night work and/or changes in schedules, 2) selecting out potential shiftworkers who have medical predispositions toward illness on shiftwork schedules, 3) training workers and their families on how to cope with shiftwork, especially in the areas of family life, stress, sleep, and nutrition, 4) analyzing and matching the site-dependent operational, biological, and social requirements to an appropriate shiftwork schedule, and 5) surveying the workforce periodically and studying safety, productivity, and absence records to ascertain problems with (and possible modifications to) the current shiftwork schedule. It is important to note that the above list encompasses many disciplines and approaches to improving the status quo of shiftwork. This multi-faceted nature can best be termed a “human factors” approach, which necessarily should recognize all the components in this complex sociological-biological-technological system. It is hoped that human factors specialists will lend their considerable broad-based talents to solving shiftwork problems in the decades to come.

The four papers in this session represent the major ways human resource managers can improve the work life of shiftworkers. The first report, by Dr. Charles A. Czeisler, describes in detail how shiftwork schedules can be designed for maximum biocompatibility, based on an actual intervention at a selected work site. The second paper, by Dr. Marty Klein, reports the comparative analysis of 8-hour versus 12-hour shifts in a case study of the electric power industry. This topic is especially appropriate, given the current popularity of compressed workweeks among many industrial workers. The third presentation, by Ms. Janie O'Connor, illustrates the design and utilization of a shiftworker training program to enhance the coping skills of shiftworkers and their families. In addition, the results of a public health intervention study of shiftworkers in the paper and mining industries will be presented. Finally, the fourth paper, by Dr. Susan Koen, discusses the critical role of organizational development in creating a management culture best capable of running 24-hour organizations. Each of these contributions represents a blend of theory, research, and actual practice in solving parts of the puzzle on how to manage shiftwork.