24/7 Support

Operations rarely work only 9 to 5
(courtesy of www.uniquesquared.com)

The most effective part of any operation is the ability to run 24/7 to keep product moving.  It is also one of the worst parts of an operation if you are an employee who likes the Monday though Friday day shift.  How can you keep full support of your operation without  alienating good employees who value free time to spend with family, hobbies, etc.?

For a lean operation, many of the Monday to Friday day crew will have to support second shift and/or weekend operations. The simplest way to do this is set up a rotation with the day crew to support a week or two of nights and weekends during the calender year.  A master schedule set up at the beginning of the year to cover the entire year is the first step.  An Excel spreadsheet works well and is filed in a group file on the organization's designated drive where all employees can access it. Of course you should have a backup if something happens to the original.  This lets everyone put it anything appointments that can't be missed (i.e. weddings, graduations, vacations).  Before or after this the lead will set up the shifts to get full coverage for the operation while ensuring everyone has a fair and equal turn at supporting the "off hour" shifts.  Any adjustments can be made at any time during the year so it is a very fluid schedule.  If a person is scheduled to work the weekend, he or she can arrange to shift their schedule for that week, having Monday and Tuesday off for instance. This type of system was successful when I worked at Boeing and ensured all shifts were covered with engineering support.

Another method is the use of pagers/company cellphones.  This is a less effective in that if an employee lives far from the operation, driving in may take time and the operation will be delayed longer.  In addition it is often difficult to fully  describe a problem over the phone and get a true sense of the issue at hand.  Sending pictures of the Internet may require a laptop with special secure access installed, not necessarily available to a personal home computer.

(courtesy www.economicdevelopmenthq.com)