Working Hours Management
Amidst Conflicting Interests

Arranging working hours requires finding a common denominator between at least two positions:

1. The Employees’ Point of View

Working hours are an important determinant of quality of life and of work.  Both due to health-related aspects and with respect to free-time scheduling, the location, duration, distribution of, and possibilities for participation in the arrangement of working hours are fundamental. Harmonizing personnel assignments with staffing needs secures a steady workload. A good concept for substitution-needs alleviates the strain resulting from requested vacation time and from sick leave. And last but not least, the scope and often also the circumstances (e.g. bonuses) and flexibility (e.g. over-time, standby premium pay) of working hours determine earnings.

2. The Companies’/Organizations’ Point of View

Individual working hours need to be brought in line with production- and opening-hours. Personnel are both service providers and expense factors, which is why a lack of balance between personnel assignment and staffing needs can quickly turn into a cost driver (over-time, idle time costs, service quality, waste, risk of injury). An extension of operating hours and/or increased flexibility of working hours can have positive effects on competitiveness, product- or service- quality and on investment levels.

Tensions arise between the interests of employees and those of companies, and the fundamental importance of working hours requires that these are alleviated through professional workforce/working hours management. This is a core task for a company’s leadership.

Working hours management describes the balancing act between demand coverage, profitability and ergonomics, and aims to achieve optimal conciliation between the need for working hours and actually available working hours (while complying with the regulatory framework). Sustainable solutions need to be found and nurtured; changes need to be implemented quickly and transparently.

Put in simplified terms, the following levels of working hours management can be identified.

• Level -1: “It has always been like this.”
  Working hours are to be understood within a historical context only.  Nobody knows whether the circumstances and total volume of working hours are consistent with demand, or there is an awareness of considerable inconsistency.
• Level 0: “Our neighbors do it this way, too.”
  Occasionally small changes, which are copied from other companies or from a successful division, are implemented. However, it is not clear whether these are actually appropriate for all circumstances.
• Level 1: “We have a model! Uff!”
  For important areas, cost-effective, legally – and ergonomically – clean working time models do exist. In ideal cases, the flexibility-potential of working time models is actively utilized. However, every change in the models requires a show of strength. 
• Level 2: “We manage models!”
  Professional workforce/working hours management: all models are regularly tested and re-designed, flexibility-potential is actively developed.  Changes occur transparently and swiftly.

To prevent having to newly discuss every decision made and all arising issues for every working time model, standardized working hours management processes are needed – of course with the involvement of employees, superiors, substitute employees and other participating groups. Implementing and sustaining such processes requires strength – particularly from executives. When they become effective, however, they take enormous burdens off of all participants.