Working Nights

Try and Take Full Advantage of Recovery Days – Especially over the Holidays

There have been a number of studies done on the importance of recovery days after working shifts. It’s logical….our bodies (and minds) can’t work at odd hours, long days, or rapidly rotating schedules, without being seriously impacted. Now, a few days before Christmas and a week before New Year’s, almost everyone is suffering from depleted energy. But as we continue to push ourselves to persevere, saying, “Just hold on and get through the holidays; it’ll be over soon,” we seek our ways to cope. Often we do this in a robotic-like fashion, not even consciously. We might drink a little too much hoping to calm ourselves down for sleep, pop pain-killers to reduce our aches and pains from all the running around, or skip dinner in favor of Doritos because we’re too tired to cook.

Sound familiar? These are the feelings, vegetative state, and survival tactics most shift workers face on a regular basis, not just around the holidays. If you work shifts, you know.

Back to recovery days……
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The Connection Between Safety and Teamwork – It’s all about Communication and Taking Workers’ Individual Differences into Account!

Starting as young children, we’re taught about the importance of teamwork.  For example, we might have learned to work together to bring the groceries in from the car – maybe one person brought the bags into the house, another took them into the kitchen, another unpacked them, and someone else put the food away in the cabinets and fridge.  It felt fun working together at something; the experience was certainly more enjoyable than anyone doing the whole job on their own.  And, we could see that this four person exercise accomplished the task in a quarter of the time it would take one person to do the whole thing (if you were lucky enough to have four people to pitch in and help!).

Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “No member of a crew is praised for the rugged individuality of his rowing.”  

As adults we’re told that teamwork is critical to achieving success in our jobs too.  But, is this really the case?

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Knowledge of Brain Research will Separate Successful Operations from Others

Research about the brain is leading to amazing results. New discoveries can help us understand ways that the brain may restrict shift workers from maximizing their potential – and – give us more ideas about what can be done about it. Topics ranging from how training provides our brains with greater processing speed and an enhanced ability to multi-task to how our brains control our reaction to invasion of our personal space are covered in this post. Whether its figuring out how people from different cultures can get along better to why getting more stage four sleep is important to learning from training, each of these new brain related studies are important for human resources, safety, and health professionals in any shift work environment to be aware of. And, they are critical for shift workers themselves to understand, as well.
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Working Nights Launches 2010 Calendar Season and Announces New Calendar for Health Care Workers

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Circadian Age, Inc. Announces Launch of New 2010 Working Nights Calendar for Health Care Workers

Boston, MA – (September 9, 2009) – Circadian Age, Inc., – ‘Working Nights’ - specializing in helping managers and employees of organizations with round the clock operations adjust to their unique lifestyles, announces its new 2010 calendar for health care workers. The calendar helps workers in hospitals, assisted living facilities, ambulance units, nursing care facilities, and health clinics face the work/life challenges they encounter as a result of their unusual, and often variable, work schedules.

“Medical workers experience tremendous stress on the job which can lead to fatigue and sleep impairment,” reports Betsy Connolly, Working Nights’ President. “Our calendar provides workers with meaningful tips about health and safety and an opportunity to better manage their lives when working shifts.”

The topics highlighted in the calendar all focus on related health and safety education and prevention for medical workers. February’s topic is Reducing Ergonomic Risks. According to a recent report by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2.5% of nursing aides, orderlies, and attendants experienced Musculoskeletal Disorders (MSDs) – injuries or illnesses that affect the connective tissues of the body such as muscles, nerves, joints, tendons, cartilage, or spinal discs. This rate is more than seven times the average national rate of MSDs for all occupations. According to the report, almost 30 percent of all days away from work were related to MSDs. Preventing MSDs requires work scheduling that reduces the time of exposure to demanding work conditions and promotes healthful work–rest patterns.

With the increased use of on-line shift scheduling by health care employees, workers need to make sure that the shift schedules they sign up for maximize sleep opportunities to prevent fatigue related errors, provide adequate recovery periods to limit personal injury risk, and provide time for social activities with friends and family members. Other calendar topics include, Men and Women and Sleep, Managing Hazardous and Toxic Substances, Lowering Stress and Anxiety, New Tips about Caffeine, Restless Leg Syndrome and Vitamin Tips. The calendar incorporates color-coded stickers to help workers and their families manage their day-to-day lives.

For the full release please see Working Nights Calendar for Health Care Workers

Learning from Past Mistakes about Managing Overtime after a Recession

After the last recession was over in 2002, overtime spiked at many extended hours operations and so did accidents and injuries on the job. After a recession, managers are usually gun-shy about hiring and for good reason – they want to feel confident that demand is truly back so they don’t generate oversupply. There are starting to be some early signs of improvement in the current economic climate, which means we may see overtime starting to creep up soon. Now’s the time to start planning in order to prevent accidents and injuries resulting from overtime.
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Workplace Bullying Increases Sleep Disorder Risk – Already a Problem for Shift Workers

Bullying in the workplace can range from one extreme – physical violence and homicide, to verbal insults, threats, teasing, ridiculing, and making false accusations – at the other end. Sometimes bullies use name-calling, talking about a person behind their back, ignoring a person, and making false accusations to set a co-worker up for failure. The targeted person may be a boss, insubordinate, or peer. No matter who’s being targeted, bullying in the workplace has been proven to decrease morale amongst all workers, and if allowed to continue, bullying will detrimentally impact business results, possibly in a material way. A new study has found that current or past bullying is associated with increased sleep disturbances. Makes sense, right? A person who is being bullied is probably a nervous wreck, so having trouble sleeping seems logical. But, it turns out that bullying has detrimental effects on sleep even when it’s being experienced indirectly – by observing it as a co-worker.
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Positive Benefits of Working Shift Work

Let’s face it, many people who work shift work only talk about the negative. But for some, it’s the positive aspects that lead the way. There are certain lifestyle benefits that can come from working shifts. For example, some people choose to work shift work for social, financial, or lifestyle reasons. Read this article…

Ten Secrets to Good Communication

Have you ever had to talk with someone about a topic that you just knew would cause either you or the other person to be very uncomfortable? Unfortunately at work, home, or in other personal settings, personalities may clash, or issues that need to be discussed are so “hot” that it’s almost like a volcano errupting. Discussing safety issues at work can be one of these topics that causes angst in communication between otherwise very calm and relaxed people. But, safety problems have to be addresses, so we need to learn how to talk about them. Read this article…

New York Times Opinion Supports Napping and Working Nights Agrees

Here’s the letter to the Editor and the link to the original editorial:

August 5, 2009
To the Editor:

Re “To Nap, Perchance to Dream” (editorial, Aug. 5):

I agree wholeheartedly with the statements made about the positive effects of a good nap.

But as an expert in researching, writing and consulting with numerous companies regarding employees’ readiness for work, I know that many not only allow naps, they even provide napping facilities.

These businesses recognize just what the editorial pointed out, that “short naps enhance alertness and productivity.” Our work on how our bodies’ circadian rhythms affect workers’ abilities to focus and concentrate, particularly in businesses running 24/7, supports that even just a 20-minute nap can be highly invigorating.

Betsy Connolly
President, Circadian Age Inc.
Wayland, Mass., Aug. 5, 2009

A version of this article appeared in print on August 6, 2009, on page A28 of the New York edition.

Working with People from Different Ethnic Backgrounds

In a short time, the current designation of “minority” will lose its meaning. By 2042 minorities are expected to become the majority of the population, and even sooner the majority of children will be minorities. This shift will bring increasing changes to the workforce, as even now some shift work fields have up to twice as many minority workers as white workers. Despite this, many of the managers of these companies are white. Understanding diversity and overcoming educational inequalities will remain extremely important for employee well-being and company productivity.
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Integrating Shift Workers Into the Overall Business Environment

Happy employees are productive. Happy shift workers gain more satisfaction out of their shifts, have better levels of fitness and more restful sleep, and cost their company less in absences and health care costs. An efficient way to raise shift workers’ confidence level and performance is to emphasize their connection with the overall company, a tie that often goes over looked throughout the night shift hours. Since managers and more experienced workers most often work the day shift, though tiredness at night might require more care for the night shift to do the job safely and well. The absence of feedback and encouragement for people working nights and the potential of fewer training hours for shift workers does not take into account unique difficulties shift workers face. Making sure extended hours workers don’t get ignored ensures higher morale and productivity throughout the whole 24 hours. Read this article…

Shift Workers as Knowledge Workers

As the world of work and industry evolves, shift workers can no longer be contained in the small box they once were. Shift work incorporates all types of jobs and occupations, and management needs to realize how to encourage and support the new breed of shift worker. Way back in 1959, business commentator Peter Drucker, whom a recent Business Week article called “the man who invented management”, coined the term “Knowledge Worker.” He created the idea that many workers traditionally considered blue-collar have a unique ability to learn and process information in their subject area. Extended hours workers are often experts about their jobs in a way no one else is, and managers need to focus on training and supporting night and shift workers so they can make better use of their ability. Until companies realize they need to tap into these gifts of their employees, they will be letting millions of dollars of potential go to waste. Read this article…

Time Management in Shift Work Operations

Time often seems to move differently at 3 AM when you’re finishing your shift and haven’t slept in 18 hours and it’s hard to see through the glaze over your eyes, from at 4 PM when you’re relaxing in your house and the sun is bright and you can’t hold on to the minutes for long enough. Time is certainly relative. This problem applies to shift work managers as well, when the day time shift can seem so efficient and goal-oriented, until everything falls apart at night. Many executives make the same mistakes about their night shifts and extended hours workers, causing the company to waste time and money. Managers need to put greater priority on training night shift workers, arranging specific goals for the night shift, and arranging clear methods of communication between shifts. Read this article…