SHIFT SCHEDULES AND COMMUNICATIONS
It is no secret that effective communications up and down the organization is essential to facilitate smooth operations. The literature we have surveyed indicates that that less than 50% of shift workers consider communication with their managers as effective. Why is this? Do managers avoid communicating with workers? That is not likely.
Shift work operations pose a unique set of communication problems.
- Sixty percent or more of the time a shift worker is at work, top management, administrative, and human resource personnel are not at work.
- A three-shift operation often functions like three different universes.
- Most shift workers are more loyal to their crew (team) members than they are to the company. Thus, they are typically less responsive to information coming from non-shift worker sources.
- Shift positions are more often than not filled by three or more (includes relief positions) individuals that must coordinate their efforts, yet they may only see each other when shift change occurs, or not at all.
Improving Management Communication
While there are many parts to effective management, communications in shift work operations. Four important steps that a manager one can do to improve communication and the perception of the quality of that communication are to:
- Schedule line managers to work off-shift
Part of a line manager’s responsibility is to manage the personnel keeping the operation running on weekends and nights.
Most managers that implement this solution choose a day in the week (say Tuesday) that they will either come in to work early and go home early or come in late and stay late.
The part of their day that overlaps regular day-shift activities is used for those types of activities, and the rest of the day is devoted to walking the floor, or scheduling formal and informal meetings with shift employees (either salaried or hourly) to communicate business issues.
These opportunities for direct interaction between managers and shift employees open the door for effective communication between management and the workforce.
- Schedule periodic (at least quarterly) meetings with all shift personnel
These meetings formalize the communication process between management and the workforce. They ensure that all employees are exposed to at least the minimum information needed for them to understand why and how the business is operating in the current economic environment. They also provide an open channel for communication from employees to upper management.
- Involve shift managers in the daily decision-making process for their areas, and expose them to the decision-making processes used in other areas.
Companies that have the most success communicating business issues with their shift workers have shift managers that have ownership for the business decisions that are made.
- Give night and afternoon shift employee’s exposure to personnel performing job functions that are best done on day shift.
Occasionally exposing shift-personnel to the difficulties of the non-shift part of the organization helps broaden their perspective, and often changes their perception of what it takes to make a company successful.
Other Communication Mechanisms
Improving management communications is the first step in a successful communication solution for a shift work operation. Shift to shift, department to department, location to location, and other communication issues must also be addressed. Other communication mechanisms that have been used successfully include:
1. Closed Circuit TV Monitors
2. Intranets
3. Shift Briefings Used Email
4. Employee / Management Roundtables
5. Employee Improvement Committees
6. Bulletin Boards
7. Newsletters
8. Labor / Management Roundtables
9. Roundtables involving representatives from each shift