2015 - 3
Oh My, Did You See the Toilets at Glastonbury!
Last weekend over a hundred thousand people descended on Glastonbury. They had over 1,300 toilets strategically placed over the site. Your nose told you very quickly which were the best, so festival goers quickly got the knack of planning their routes so they could go to the best toilets. Everyone’s favourite was the compost loos; they had a longer queue but didn’t smell and were a hundred times cleaner.
It’s interesting how rarely anyone ever talks about toilets; it is only through extreme shared experiences that we ever discuss it. Yet it is a normal bodily function and vital to our health and wellbeing. At Glastonbury the program even mentioned the dangers of not going and recommended that everyone should be passing urine at least three times a day to avoid dehydration. Yet when we are at work, going to the toilet is often frowned on or discouraged. The toilets are hidden away, or you have to pass through the gauntlet of multiple locks and stares to access the toilet. In extreme cases, where an alternate (cover person) has to be used for any break, a toilet break has to be requested. This can often discourage people from using the toilet regularly.
Yet as I said going to the toilet is a natural bodily function and vital to our wellbeing. So when it is discouraged, people avoid drinking as much which leads to dehydration. This in turn has an effect on the body’s immune system and the body’s ability to digest food and remove toxins. In the long term this will affect your health and can cause serious illnesses.
So when you are planning your operations, spare a thought for the toilets. Are they easily accessible? Have you allowed for regular toilet breaks? Have you thought about staggered breaks to reduce the queue times? Are they in the correct proportion of ladies to gentlemen for your workforce?
A healthy workforce is a more productive and efficient workforce. If you don’t have enough toilets then you need a good absence management system to cope when illness breaks out!
Why Do Shift Workers have Easter Monday as a Bank Holiday?
Easter Monday, holds no religious significance, yet it is a Bank Holiday because it is the day after Easter Sunday. Therefore office workers get an extra day off. However, shift worker who work the weekend still have Easter Monday as a Bank Holiday.
Wouldn’t it be more practical to have the Bank Holiday as Easter Sunday which like Christmas Day is transferred to the Monday for Office Workers?
Employment Laws and working regulations were all created by Office Workers for Office Workers. So when you work shifts interesting anomalies crop up.
When an organisation is operating a 24/7 shift pattern, they need to revisit their terms and conditions of employment to see if it needs rewriting or if an appendix should be added for shift workers.
How to Manage Your Shift Pattern is a book to help you run your shift operation efficiently. There is a whole chapter on Terms and Conditions of Employment with examples of how to add shift related definitions and procedures. Available now from Amazon.
And while we are on the subject of Bank Holidays, did you know the official Christmas Day in 2016 will occur after Boxing Day.
Weekends are Precious
For most of us our weekends are precious, they are times when our family and friends are available. Already when I try to organise meeting up with friends, I am hearing the lament that everyone is now booked up till September. No one likes to feel they have wasted a weekend, especially during the summer. So barbeques, picnics, theatre, parties, weddings all need to be arranged long before if you hope anyone will come. Then everyone seems to be away on holiday, “I’m just off to …” or “I just got back from …” Italy, Greece, Spain, with the odd China and Australia thrown in for good measure.
It feels like the summer has already come and gone.
However shift workers don’t have every weekend off. Most shift workers will work some weekends during the year. The number depends on, how many are required at weekends and their shift length. Therefore shift workers will place a higher value their weekends off than office hours workers who get every weekend off.
That is why when you create a shift pattern you need to consider how the weekends will fall;
- Are they split?
When you consider introducing a shift pattern, you need to think about how your shift workers will operate on the shift pattern. If they only get four weekends off per year would they be happy? That may sound extreme yet I have seen shift patterns which inadvertently only allow shift workers one weekend off per quarter unless they book a holiday. Cover arrangements and split weekends can severely limit the number of whole weekends off.
On average most 8-hour shift patterns allow shift workers one weekend off in four or 13 weekends off per year. On average most 12-hour shift patterns allow shift workers one weekend off in two or 26 weekends off per year. Then holidays can be booked on top of this number.
However shift workers do have a few advantages over office hours workers. They may work on weekends, but in return they get days off during the week. Then they can get all the boring jobs done during the week, when there are less queues. The picture above is from a 1940's film on Every Minute Counts and why workers are absent. Shift worker don't have the same problems, they can actually get to see a doctor, enjoy cheap seats at the cinema on Mondays and watch Wimbledon without booking a holiday. This all means that when you do have a weekend off, you can just enjoy it with friends and family. Cleaning the house, shopping etc. have all been done during the week.
To find out more about shift pattern design go to: http://www.oranalysts.com/optimising-shift-working/creating-a-shift-pattern
Why do we fail?
Philosophers Samual Gorovitz and Alasdair MacIntyre back in the 1970’s tried to answer the question: “Why do we fail when we set out to succeed?” They observed that sometimes it is inevitable because it is beyond our capability. However if this is not the case then we fail through ignorance or ineptitude. If we are ignorant of how to do something then it is more than likely we will make mistakes and fail. However, even when we know what we are doing in theory, mistakes can happen, procedures are not followed correctly or our assumptions are wrong.
At work most of us will never fail because it is beyond our capability. I don’t know if that makes most of us boring, but who would hire someone if there were any chance that they were hiring them to do the impossible? Normally it is only researchers and inventors that have that problem. For the rest of us, we fail because of ignorance or ineptitude.
So when it comes to managing people how to we ensure that we will succeed. After all success is in our grasp. Well, ignorance can be combated through knowledge; specialists, training courses and books are out there to help us. However knowledge is only part of the problem, it is the application of knowledge that determines our success.
Do you know that when it comes to disasters there are three types of people; those who can always cope, those who could cope and those that can’t. The ratio is about 20:60:20, a Prato principle. 20% even without knowledge or planning can think on their feet enough to know what to do. 20% even with all the knowledge, planning and training will still go to pieces and panic. However the remaining 60% could follow a procedure if they have been trained.
That is why every time you get on an airplane you are told what to do in an emergency. That is why you take part in fire drills and first aid courses. But there is no point in trying to find out which type of person you and your colleagues are. If you are in the 20% who could cope, well a little extra training and knowledge can’t hurt. If you are in the 20% who would just panic, then the more people about you with the skills to cope, the greater your likelihood of surviving. And if you are in the majority then with a little bit of training, your life could be saved. So it is better to train everyone in the skills and knowledge to survive an emergency.
However this philosophy does not apply just to disasters. Everyday the unexpected could happen. If you are in the 20% who could cope, that’s great, as long as you are always there, you know everything will work out. However, you can’t guarantee to be there when the emergency arrives, absence or holidays will prevent that. I was always told that “A good manager could cope with the unexpected. However a great manager never has to be there.” That is because they have set up procedures and delegated reasonability. A great manger thinks ahead, anticipates what could happen, then sets up procedures to cope with any contingency.
I help mangers to set up procedures to cover what if scenarios. Using my many years’ experience, of working with companies around the world, to set up and organise staffing operations, I can help you predict what will happen. I can tell you how many of your staff will be absent each day, then help you set up procedures to combat every possible scenario. Then you don’t have to worry about absence. Holidays are predictable, they will happen every year, so I can help you spread out everyone’s holidays so that they can have the time off they want without disrupting the operation. Workload can be predicted, it doesn’t matter how random it may seem to you, there is always a pattern, there is always cause and effect. I can help you see the patterns; I can help you adjust your staffing levels to match. Then I can help you set up procedures so that the warning signs are recognisable and the procedures can be followed.
So help your staff succeed! Be a great manger not just a good one and ensure that come plague, school holidays, Christmas, or the World Cup, your operation will run effectively. Have a Business Health Check and ensure that you have the best shift pattern for your staff and contingency plans to cope with the unexpected.
Sunny Mornings
Well the summer is finally here and we are enjoying sporadic sunshine. However we can now experience one of the problems night workers tackle daily. This morning I was woken at 4:40 by the dawn. Sunshine was streaming in around my blinds and the birds were celebrating the sun with a singing competition. To me this was a minor annoyance, and seeing the sun after days of rain and overcast skies makes up for the inconvenience.
However night workers have to be able to sleep and get good quality sleep when the sun is streaming in and surrounded by the noise of daily life. There are lots of things you can do to help yourself sleep during the day.
If you want to get a good quality sleep first think about your environment. You spend a third of your life sleeping, so your bedroom should be designed to help you sleep. First things first, is the bed. The difference between sleeping in a comfortable bed and roughing it are pronounced. So invest in a good bed. Then there is the rest of the room, a bedroom, is not an office, storage room or an extension of your living room. Your bedroom should be relaxing and uncluttered. It is always easier to fall asleep in a cool room which is light and airy. Too cold and you spend the night shivering. Too warm and you just feel claustrophobic and uncomfortable.
The light levels need to be reduced for sleep. Black out curtains are great at reducing the light levels on those rare sunny days. But I find it is not so much light that disturbs my sleep as a change in the light levels. The stray light of the morning sunshine peaking in round my blinds or a lamp left on, doesn’t affect my sleep half as much as the annoying blinking of the pin prick of light my phone gives off.
As for noise levels, what would be ideal is a sound proof room, but people tend to look at you a bit strangely if you cover your bedroom walls with egg boxes. So why not try filling up the background with soothing sounds, the rainforest or white noise. What you need is something that is not jerky or harsh. If you have ever tried to fall asleep with a fan or an annoying pump in the background, you will know how load they can get in the stillness of the night. What you need is something to mask out the outside noises and help you relax.
Always remember that it is important to get good quality rest if you hope to operate effectively and enjoy the sunshine while we have it. My new book “The Office After Dark” will be out in the Autumn and is designed to help night workers get the most out of their shifts.
How do you store you wine?
The other day I was down in Oxford, so decided to stop in at Waddesdon on my way back. Waddesdon happens to be one of my favourite National Trust properties and is well worth a visit if you are in the neighbourhood. Unfortunately I was too late to tour the house but the wine cellar was still open. They have a very impressive cellar with tasting rooms and wine vaults. Just the sort of thing the Rothschild’s would have needed in the Edwardian era to impress their esteemed guests.
However the thing that struck me amongst all this grandeur was their poor storage sequence. They had three wine vaults;
- Vault 1 (and the first you come across): The Centenary Vault
- Vault 2 (second you come across): The Grands Formats Collection
- Vault 3 (the one right at the back): The Working Cellar
From this we can infer that they had put the oldest wines in the first vault. Obviously this had been the only one they originally used. Then in the second vault they had stored all the best wines, to keep them separate. Then they had started to fill up these vaults so the third one had come into play for the everyday wine. All very logical.
However the result is very illogical. The working cellar is now at the back, and the special wines are at the front. So it will always take you longer now to select a bottle of wine. Not to mention there is the temptation to select a better wine because you have to walk right past them first. When you are storing things for a very long time this illogical storage system will inevitably result. Human nature will always push us to do the minimal amount of work so you store things in the closest bin.
When I have visited warehouses, I have noticed a similar thing. The most popular and newest items are stored at the back of the warehouse, because the front was full of the older and out of favour stock. This means that picking times are unnecessarily long. Hence more pickers are needed to keep up with demand.
In my webpage on Inventory Management, I discuss having an annual review of your stock. This is where you not only do a stock take but also assess if the warehouse is still organised in the best order for your current requirements.
So when you open a new warehouse or wine cellar, you should think about filling it up from the back. That way you will always store the most current products at the front.
"How was work?"
Every day millions of people ask that question; “How was work?” When you get home, when you are out with your friend. What would your answer be? Did you have a good day at work? Or would your answer be:
“Stressful”
“Tiring”
“Traumatic”
“Hectic”
“I didn’t stop all day!”
“This is the first chance I’ve had to put my feet up, all day!”
Can you pin point the reason you had problems today? Was it because someone was sick? Or is someone off on holiday and you got landed covering their work as well as your own?
All organisations have very similar problems, including: accommodating annual leave and coping with absences. As part of our work, we work with organisations to set up mechanisms which allow all staff to take their holidays without disrupting the operation. As well as the means to cover and cope with unexpected and expected absences.
If you would like to know more about managing your operation for efficiently then why not come to our seminar Efficient Shift Scheduling. Or contact us today and find out how we can help you have a better work/life balance.
Do your staffing levels match your workload?
If you don’t know what staffing levels you are trying to match, then you will always be incorrectly staffed. Shifts and Hours tables are the corner stone of shift scheduling. We start off the process of creating a shift schedule with an Hours Table’. It’s simple, along the top are the 24 hours for the day and down the side are the seven days off the week.
This figure is an example of the ‘Hours Table’. In this example the operation requires three people on during core hours Monday-Saturday 8am-4pm. During the rest of the week they require two people at all times. At the end of the table is a count of the total number of hours for each day and the week. In this example these staffing levels would require 384 hours per week.
Such a simple tool, yet from it you can work out the hours you require per week, and hence the number of people you need to employ to operate efficiently.
Then you can compare your required staffing levels with your current staffing levels. Do they match?
We have developed an Excel spreadsheet that allows us to create the shifts and plots them against the desired staffing profile for each day. So with the example where three are required on during core hours and two at all other times, let’s see what shifts would support this profile best. The graph below shows how we match the required staffing numbers to the number supplied by the shifts. Each day would have a different staffing requirement we would have to match. The one below would work for Monday to Saturday in this example. The required number would be entered from the ‘Hours Table’. The Shift Number would be based on the shifts used. This way we can check if the shifts met the requirement. In this example we have matched the requirement.
If you would like some help creating a shift schedule then please contact us directly. You can download your own copy of the ‘Hours Forms’ from http://www.visualrota.co.uk/staffingprofile.xlsx This Excel file is for one hour increments, however we also do them in half hour and quarter hour increments too depending upon your workload requirement. Academic organisations often have two sets of Hours Tables, one for Term and one for Vacation Weeks.
What's Wrong with You?
We all get sick, it is inevitable. Yet when we call in work there is the third degree over why are we ill, why did this happen, when will you be back to work? Some managers think that the best way to discourage illness is to interrogate you. The idea is to make you so uncomfortable that you will never be ill again.
But ask yourself, do you really want to be working with someone who is sick? Do you want their cold? Do you want to have to cover their workload because they have to keep running to the loo? And what happens when the illness is serious? Someone comes in looking like death warmed up, then the next thing you know they have collapsed because the journey was too much for them. Then you have to go off with them to the hospital.
Not all absences are fraudulent just because they coincide with the cup final. Here are the most common reasons for short term absence with little or no notice:
- Accident/illness while coming to work, this could include heart attack, car accident, falling down the stairs or slipping on ice.
- Cold and flu. These normally take three days to two weeks to resolve themselves. If they come back too quickly you may find the entire shift goes down with it.
- Accident/illness at work – with a secondary caveat about escorting a colleague to hospital. The most common are scolds, (don't drink your tea hot), cuts, falling down, strains from lifting too heavy objects, migraines. The first aid box is not an ornament. Ever time it is used you loose out on the person injured and the first aiders time.
- The last meal they ate disagreed with them. Food poisoning does happen. Fortunately most of us get over it in 24 hours.
- Just got back from holiday with some dreadful disease. (You should prepare for this happening every time they go abroad.) If they do winter spots they make brake a bone.
- Reoccurrence of long standing illness, e.g. migraine, epilepsy, back problems, dizziness, etc.
- Tooth problems. Cavities and infections can come on quickly.
- Other problems/diseases are:
- Diabetes
- Typhoid or Para typhoid
- Dysentery or Food Poisoning
- Jaundice
- Rheumatic Fever
- Heart Complaint
- High/low blood pressure
- Tuberculosis
- Asthma, Bronchitis, Chest Complaints
- Faints
- Skin troubles e.g. rashes, boils.
- Arthritis.
- Ruptures
- Mental problems
- Hepatitis
- AIDS
- Eventually, these will all cause absence from work.
Predicting who is likely to be ill always helps. At the end of the shift always ask "How are you?" Also encouraging your staff to report an illness helps you to cover for it. Most illnesses do not happen immediately. There is a build-up where they might feel a little off colour. Encouraging them to keep you up to date with their illnesses can help with providing cover. If they think they might not be able to come in to work tomorrow, then you can ensure that there is someone available just in case. It gives cover staff extra notice. The more notice a sick person gives you, the more you can pass on to the staff.
When considering absence, you should always consider Tardiness. What to do if they do not arrive on time? Does someone stay late from the previous shift, or do you call in a cover person? Some companies lock the door at the start of the shift. Then open it after fifteen minutes, and deduct the pay. Others do not allow the person on the previous shift to leave till they are relieved. Then they don't get paid for the extra time till it is over an hour. How many times are you going to make your colleague stay late with no overtime before they do the same to you?
If you would like to know more about covering for absence then follow this like to our website.
Or watch our video on absence tips: My Top 10 Tips for Proactive Absence Management
How to get your 2-Weeks off work!
Are you having a problem trying to book your holiday with your manager? We all look forward to that two week break, where we can go off with the family or friends. No more cares or worries. It’s just about enjoying yourself and may be if you are lucky getting a bit of sun too.
However you not only have to find that ideal holiday, you also have to get that time off from work. So how do you do it? What are you going to say that is going to get you that time off you want? Will begging work? What about playing the family card? After all it’s not your fault that the school only lets you take your kids away then? Do you find a flunky to take on your workload while you are away?
You deserve that two week break. What’s more you are entitled to it. So go out there and get it!
What you need is a way to ensure that you can have the time off you want, when you want it. What you need is a holiday management plan! You need a procedure that allows you to book the time off you want. You don’t want to have to sell your soul every time to want a holiday. The company should make it easy for you. The company should tell you how to have the time off you want.
A Holiday Management Plan is there for everyone. It is there to help you book the time off you want. After all nobody likes having to go on bended knee every time you want some time off. It shouldn’t be up to you to manage your own absence. You shouldn’t have to find someone else to do your work while you are away or prove that you are not needed that week. I holiday is a right not a luxury.
Basically a Holiday Management Plan states who can be off when. It says how many can book a holiday and when they can book that holiday. And if you abide by the rules then you can have that two week break of your choice because your manager can’t say no to you. It is unconditional. You have met the terms so you are off.
Tell you manager about our e-book Holiday Management today or post them a link to our blog http://shiftscheduling.blogspot.co.uk/2015/05/annual-leave-management.html or video on holiday management tips https://youtu.be/TtvzaUuIpjc
In the Summertime!
We are now well into spring, and the weather may be getting better? So now is the time when you sit and work and fantasise about the nice cold drink you are going to enjoy in the garden when you get home. Maybe it’s a cold beer, G&T or a Pimms. You think about sitting out there and unwinding after your hard day. There will be nothing but blue skies and bird songs. Perhaps you will be in a hammock just swaying in the breeze. Or maybe it will be with a group of friends around the barbeque.
Then you get home and that idyllic garden that you have been dreaming about all day turned into a weed infested jungle overnight. The grass needs cutting, you can’t even see the flower beds for the weeds. And did your garden furniture have that much bird muck on it this morning?
Well you can’t sit out in this. So you get out your lawn mower. You pull on your gardening gloves and on your hand and knees pull out those weeds. Then you have to make an emergency run to the tip because those green wheelie bins don’t hold anywhere near the amount of refuse your garden has managed to produce overnight. Then you clean down the furniture and get your well-deserved drink. However only you have about five minutes left of day light.
You only do that once before you realise that the garden is something to enjoy on weekends. Then you can spend all day on Saturday gardening with the promise that come Sunday you can enjoy it at your leisure.
If you enjoy gardening then office hours are not for you. Who wants to be stuck in an office when you could be out there enjoying the sunshine? Shift work on the other hand is great for gardeners. You can have up to 31 weeks off a year, and when you are working, half the time it will be at night. So you can chill out in the garden before going in to work the night shift.
If you do work shifts, 31 weeks is a lot of time off. You need something to fill up all of those hours. There are only so many holidays you can go on before it starts to affect your bank balance, not to mention how tiring it is jet setting off all the time. Sometimes you just want to kick back and relax with that nice cold drink in the garden.
Watch this video on how to organise your shifts to get 31 weeks off every year and have that idyllic garden of your dreams.
