24/7 Strategies Group - Consulting Body

Consulting Assistance

This section will answer many of your questions about the types of consulting assistance we offer and the types of questions we can answer for you.

You may prefer to scroll down this page, or choose to click on specific topics listed here, which will bring up the pertinent information to this screen area:

Getting Started / Initial Information Sessions
Evaluation and Planning Assistance
Assistance in Selecting the Shift Work Schedule
Assistance for an Effective Implementation
Assistance in Working with Your Union(s)
Education/Training for Employees on the 24/7 Schedule
Improving Operations in the 24/7 Environment

Whether you are already looking to convert to 24/7 or are just thinking about an alternative shift work schedule (24/7 being one option) or a related topic and would like to ask a question or talk about your situation - we provide Free Talk via phone at 781-237-9077 (Jim Stam), fax at 781-237-6958 or by email.

Getting Started / Initial Information Sessions (top)

Sometimes the most difficult, awkward part of a working relationship is getting started - how do you get to know more about us without making a large commitment that might not work out? We are extremely sensitive to this issue and want to go slowly so that you are totally comfortable.

Over the years, we have tried just about everything - ranging from a one or two-hour informal, "get-to-know-you" visit with management to formal on-site seminars. Our experience has been that the more structured the initial session, the more beneficial it is for you, in terms of both the information you receive and the ability to work with us for a day to determine if we fit with each other.

Thus, the most common way to get started is with either an On-Site Seminar or an Informal Education Session. These sessions are less formal than an On-Site Seminar, and are designed to address your questions and issues by capitalizing on our extensive experience. We both make an investment: you have a cost for the session and we invest far more time than is covered by our fees. And, because there is a cost to you, your leadership team will place a higher priority on participation. You benefit in many ways:

You gain a large amount of knowledge across your organization.
Your questions are answered and your issues are addressed.
You develop a road map as to how to get there - the process for successfully converting to a 24/7 operation.

Prior to the session, we usually work with your team to prepare an agenda, who should participate, and the logistics for the initial meeting. We take a plant tour, talk extensively with you or your leadership team to discuss your issues and outline your needs and objectives. In addition, we usually follow up with our thoughts on your next steps.

We welcome your call to talk in more detail about a start-up session, and we're also open to other ideas for how to get started. Please call Jim Stam at 781-237-9077 or e-mail at jimstam@24-7strategies.com.

These sessions are especially effective for groups of fewer than 10 people - larger groups require a more structured approach (On-Site Seminar) to address all of the questions which need to be addressed.

Evaluation and Planning Assistance (top)

Are you trying to determine if 24/7 is the right step for you, what parts of the plant should go to 24/7 and how to move forward with the change? The first major task for you is to complete the evaluation of your needs and plan for the change.

At this point, your leadership team probably agrees that 24/7 operation makes sense for your business, but you need to define the details of the plan for getting there: What departments should be included? How do we measure the major costs and benefits? What about maintenance? Quality assurance? Shipping / receiving / warehouse? Other support groups? How do we determine the schedule? What are the steps? When should all of the people be involved? How will we deal with concerns such as overtime (likely a major issue for the hourly people and perhaps the supervisors), child care, going to school, military duty, alternative shift work difficulties, etc? How and when should we address pay and benefits needs? What are the budgetary impacts? When and how do we announce the initial plans to the organization and who will be involved in the change process? When do we get the people involved? You probably have a longer issues/questions list than this one!

These and many other issues should be addressed in the Evaluation and Planning process. In our Seminars we cover these issues and provide guidelines for planning and problem solving. Within your organization, most often the Leadership Team assumes responsibility for this process, forming a Steering Committee to lead the remaining steps through implementation. Various tasks are assigned to Steering Committee members. The elapsed time requirement varies depending on the complexity of the situation, the number of people in your facility, the percentage of the plant which will become continuous, the budgetary impact and any approvals required.

When we work with you in a consulting mode, our assistance is geared to fit with your needs and timing. We are often an active member of the Steering Committee, participating as an advisor in many of the meetings. In other situations, our role is to help you get started and then to review progress and materials from our offices as you move ahead. We should work together to define your needs and the specific terms of our assistance.

Assistance in Selecting the Work Schedule (top)

One of the bigger challenges as you move to 24/7 is how the shift work schedule should be selected. Over the past 10 years, we have utilized a structured approach for selecting a work schedule and managing 24/7 operations. Several of the key elements are:

The people in the plant choose the schedule which fits best with their needs.
Although we can almost never come up with a schedule which is everybody's first choice, we can go through a process in which everyone can actively participate so that at the end everyone can say, "The process was the fairest possible and I had an opportunity to participate."
Boundary conditions are defined at the start so that the business needs are met by whatever schedule is chosen, and so that the schedule chosen by the people is acceptable for the business.
A Task Force is formed, consisting mostly of hourly personnel, to run the process, help with communications and get everyone in your operation to participate actively.
A survey is used to obtain people's opinions and input on the schedule and a variety of related issues. This survey is the key task in identifying those schedules which are the choice of the people.
People in the plant are educated about the shift work schedule options so that they make the most intelligent choice possible to fit with their needs.
People need time (the process takes approximately two months) to learn more about the options (there are hundreds), to determine their preferences, to review issues with family and friends, and to become more comfortable with the change.
Our role is to provide the structured process, the survey, the education and the schedule options. We also usually facilitate the Task Force meetings, support the Task Force members and answer the many questions which will come up

Assistance for an Effective Implementation (top)

Once the schedule has been determined and the implementation date established, a number of details need to be addressed prior to implementation to assure success. These include:

Determining the pay and benefits
Defining the supervisors/team leaders' needs and developing plans for meeting them
Planning for needed support functions (to the extent they are not on the 24/7 directly) - maintenance, quality assurance, engineering / technical, information systems, materials planning / scheduling / purchasing, shipping / receiving / warehouse, human resources, etc.
Addressing the people issues such as child care, elder care, school, military duty, single parenting, etc.
Planning for overtime to meet the people's preferences
Realigning the people onto the new shifts, and training people who bid into new jobs
Hiring and training added new employees
Establishing communications mechanisms including meetings around the schedule
Planning for performance reporting to assure that goals are met (an often overlooked step)
Defining management coverage and support
Planning for the transition weekend
Establishing the mechanism for monitoring post-implementation, the schedule, people issues and performance

We provide technical and facilitation assistance for this part of the conversion process, building on our experience in hundreds of other implementations to help you find the answers which best meet your needs and objectives.

Assistance in Working with Your Union(s) (top)

Most of the issues are the same for a union environment, with several exceptions:

The pay and benefits issues are defined in the collective bargaining agreement which means that they often must be addressed earlier in the process.
The union needs to be brought into the process as early as possible so that they become your partner rather than your adversary.
The union leadership may buy into the need for a change to 24/7 but may not see how to "sell" it to the membership.

Our experience in working in union environments includes:

Educating joint management and union groups, usually the bargaining team, on the issues related to this change. This education is often the first step in the process and follows the structure of the Initial Information Session. One key part of this session is to try to help the joint group to see potential solutions which will work for them, including answers to questions which seem to be major stumbling blocks, such as how to address the overtime question.
Developing the strategy for modifying the collective bargaining agreement to fit with the 24/7 schedule.
Establishing a framework for the membership to choose the schedule within the parameters of the collective bargaining agreement.

Union leadership frequently is active with plant leadership throughout the process, participating in the Evaluation and Planning tasks, being members of the steering committee and actively working on the tasks in planning for an effective implementation.

We have worked closely with numerous companies and unions, including several who were stalled for up to a year, on how to make this change. By providing education, helping to visualize solutions which will work, and bringing structure to the process, we are able to help companies and unions develop the needed answers together.

Education/Training for Employees on the 24/7 Schedule (top)

In these sessions, supervisors and employees learn the best ways to manage their lifestyle with a 7-day work schedule, addressing topics such as sleep (for night shift people), substances (caffeine, alcohol and sleeping pills) which affect sleep and alertness, nutrition for shiftworkers, family and social issues and alertness in the plant. Spouses usually join workers in attending these sessions.

A great deal of research has been done about sleep and circadian rhythms. No facility can ignore the realities of the impact of natural processes on the employees who work non-day shifts. Forewarned is forearmed; we teach participants what to expect and how to adjust successfully and safely.

Improving Operations in the 24/7 Environment (top)

You have implemented a 24/7 schedule in part or all of your plant within the past few weeks or few years, and you find that your goals are not being met. It may be that the people love the new schedule but it isn't meeting performance goals such as productivity, quality or safety. On the other hand, performance may be fine, but the people are unhappy with certain key aspects. Perhaps, the business needs have changed and some fine tuning will be required. Or, you think that you're not getting the most possible out of the 24/7 work place.

Our experience indicates that what is needed is a process to identify the issues and implement the changes needed to achieve a successful mid-course correction. This process should be a joint project, including leadership, supervisors and hourly employees. Our role is to provide both facilitation and technical assistance to this effort.

We have several diagnostic tools to be used in this work:

A structured audit for assessing the status of the "new" 24/7
operation and identifying the problem areas.
An employee survey to assess employee satisfaction with
the 24/7 schedule and identify people problems.
Benchmark data from other organizations which have converted
to 24/7 (to be available during the third quarter of 2000).

Most importantly, we bring our experience from all of the conversions we have seen, what works and what does not.