Strengthening Safety With Shift Scheduling Principles

Control center operators, truckers, 911 dispatchers, space engineers and ship captains have all been caught in shift scheduling incidents that made the courts and 6 p.m. news. To reduce such notoriety and losses, safety personnel should spend more time talking with shift scheduling management.

Although the safety and scheduling function are usually housed in different departments, I routinely insist that they work closely together during schedule planning.

Shiftwork Benchmarking Institute has hosted dozens of interviews and cross-industry benchmarking groups, revealing their 24/7 histories, issues and best scheduling practices. From this knowledge, I compiled the "SBI Scheduling Principles."

These are scheduling principles found to reduce human error and improve 24/7 performance and profitability in many industries – including manufacturing, chemical, electric power, refining, mining, security and police. (Via Occupational Hazards)