The Question Leaders Avoid

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Here's a question that I want every leader of a 24-7 organization to have a think about. When somebody puts a proposal in front of you for shift work education and there's a figure at the bottom of the page, it's really easy to see that cost. $10,000, $14,000. Whatever the investment happens to be, bang, it's in black and white. It's right there and it's in front of you. But here's the question that we rarely ask. What is it going to cost you to not educate your shift workers? Because just because you don't spend the money, it doesn't mean that you're saving it. The cost is probably showing up somewhere else. And that is exactly what I want to talk about today. Because it doesn't have to be this way. Whether you're a shift worker, trying to feel better, or a leader responsible for the people who keep your organisation running around the clock, you're in the right place. Welcome to a healthy shift. I'm Roger Sutherland, and after more than four decades of working 24-7 shifts with Victoria Plus, followed by years of studying nutrition, circadian biology, human performance, and working with literally thousands of shift workers, I've made it my mission to change the conversation around shift work. Because healthier people create stronger teams, and stronger teams build better organizations. And it all starts by understanding how to work with your biology and not against it. Let's get into today's episode.

We Train Jobs Not Biology

SPEAKER_00 2:05

And welcome back to a healthy shift, the shift workers podcast. This episode's probably a little different because I'm speaking directly to the people, you, the leader, the manager, the person that makes a decision within organizations that are operating around the clock. But if you are a shift worker and you're listening to this, I want you to stay with me because this conversation is absolutely about you. Now, I spent more than 40 years working 24-7 shifts myself. And there's one thing that I keep coming back to after all those years. I just didn't get any education. It was just surprising as to how little education we are traditionally given about how to actually live around the roster. And I want you to think about that for a moment. I know that I am the person that I wish I knew when I started my shift working job. If I had known me, things would have been completely different. And it's my mission. And this is why I return to study to help you, the shift worker, with this. Now, an organization employs somebody into a role that requires them to work overnight. We tell them when their shift starts. We tell them when it finishes. We teach them how to do their job. We train them in the policies, the procedures, the control, safety, systems, compliance. We tell them who to report to. They even know where the bathroom is and when their breaks are. And then when we send them out to work at two, three, four o'clock in the morning, when their biologies tell them they should be asleep. But how much time do we spend teaching them about that biology? And how much do we teach them about their circadian rhythm and light? About how to prepare for the sleep after night shift? About caffeine timing, about eating overnight, about movement, recovery. What about how to transition between nights and days? Because in far too many workplaces, in fact, in nearly every workplace, the answer is none. Or very, very little. So what happens? So what happens is the people start working it out for themselves, trial and error. Or they learn from their peers that are ahead of them. They copy the person sitting beside them. They scroll social media. They try something that somebody at work told them to do. They make mistakes, they find something that seems to work. Then their roster changes and they have to start all over again. It's all trial and error. And some people will tell you, I've worked nights for 20 years, I'm fine. You'll get used to it. Maybe they do feel fine. But feeling fine doesn't mean working at night suddenly becomes biologically neutral. That's an important difference. What has become your new normal? Night work asks something completely different of the human body. And that's not a criticism of night shift. Because 24-hour organizations in today's day and age are essential. Hospitals can't close at five o'clock, and police stations don't shut overnight. Ambulances don't stop responding. Manufacturing plants, utilities, transport, aviation, mining, all the emergency services and countless other industries need people working around the clock. Now the issue isn't that shift work exists, the issue is whether we're adequately preparing people to actually perform doing those shifts. And this is where I think organizations need to start having a very different conversation.

The Hidden Costs Of Fatigue

SPEAKER_00 5:49

Because usually when we talk about shift worker education, we talk about the cost of providing it. Oh, what's it going to cost to have that seminar? What's that program going to cost? What's the training budget? Which department pays for it? Can we afford it in this financial year? Oh, let's revisit it again next year. All completely reasonable business questions. But there is another side of that equation, and this is the important one. What is the organization already paying because that education doesn't exist? And that's where things become really interesting. Let's take unplanned absence. A shift worker is exhausted, they're not recovering, their sleep is poor, they're struggling with nights, and eventually they have to call in. So what happens next? Someone else has to come in and cover that shift. Probably another employee. Maybe someone has to stay back and work a double. Perfect. The overtime gets paid. Maybe a supervisor spends time ringing around trying to find someone. Maybe the team just has to operate short. Maybe the workload gets distributed among the people who are already there. Now I'm not suggesting every absence in a 24-7 organization is caused by shift work. Of course it isn't. I'm asking a different question. How much of what you're already dealing with could have a shift work component that nobody is actually looking at? An absence is only one of them. What about the person who doesn't call in? They turn up. Technically, they're present. But they've had about three hours' sleep. They're exhausted. They've been running kids around doing things. And they're relying on caffeine to drag themselves through the night. And they're doing everything that they can just to make it to the end of the shift. That's presented. They're physically there. But are they operating with the same alertness, the concentration and cognitive capacity? I would argue no. And what does that mean for your company's productivity? The decision making, communication, teamwork. What about safety? Now again, I'm not attaching a dollar figure to that. I'm simply saying there is a cost. And there's overtime and backflip, backfill, and retention. Experienced people get to the stage where they decide I simply can't keep doing nights. Workers trying to get off the roster, fatigue. It's showing up in safety conversations. Managers are spending time dealing with workforce issues, reduced morale, operational disruption. Now, none of these things necessarily arrive on a spreadsheet labeled this is the cost of not educating our shift workers. And that is the problem because they're spread across the organization. One cost can sit in operations, another one can sit in HR, another one sits under the work safe, health and safety. Another, there's an overtime figure, there's a recruitment problem. There's an excess of workers' compensation. Another may just never be quantified in any way whatsoever. Meanwhile, the cost of the education arrives neatly packaged in one proposal. And that's why I keep coming back to this. The investment is visible. The cost of doing nothing often isn't. Now, if I put a proposal in front of an organization for $15,000, everyone can see $15,000, oh my God, it's tangible. Someone has to approve it. But if the organization chooses not to spend that $15,000, that doesn't automatically mean that they've saved $15,000. Just because you don't spend the money doesn't mean that you're saving it. And that is the mindset that I want leaders of 24-7 organizations to start challenging in their own thinking. Because while many of the people making these decisions are tucked up in bed at night, and that's not a criticism, it's simply the reality. There is another workforce operating while the rest of society sleeps. They're battling their biology to remain awake. They're making decisions, they're caring for patients, they're driving at speed, responding to emergencies and they're operating machinery. They're out there protecting communities. They're carrying firearms. They're paramedics that are making medical decisions. They're keeping production moving. They're keeping organizations functioning. And in many cases, they're sacrificing aspects of their own health and well-being to do it. So surely if we're going to ask people to do that, we have a responsibility to give them the best possible education about how to manage it. Not to make shift work perfect, because we just can't. Not to pretend that we can somehow remove the biological consequence of working at night, but we can give people a much better understanding of what's happening inside their body and practical strategies that they can use around their actual roster. Shift workers are pragmatic. They know that there's a problem. They just want simple solutions.

Education That Sticks Inside The Team

SPEAKER_00 11:18

Then we get to the next part of the problem because I don't believe bringing somebody like me into an organization once, giving me an hour, ticking the well-being box, and saying, Great, we've done the shift work. I don't think that's enough. Now don't misunderstand me. I deliver workforce education and I believe enormously in it. A great seminar can have a takeaway that literally changes the way somebody thinks. My seminars are delivered to actually show people why they feel the way that they feel, not just put it under the umbrella of shift work. Because when that happens, I give them an understanding that they've never had before, that they've never had delivered before. And this can actually create conversations. It can give people strategies that they can implement the second they walk out of the door. But education also needs somewhere to go. Because if I walk out of the building and all the knowledge walks out with me, you've literally just rented it. What happens three months later? What happens when a new employee starts? What happens at three o'clock in the morning when somebody's really struggling? What happens when the conversation around the lunchroom table goes back to, mate, this is just night shift. You'll get used to it. Because that's not right. And that's why I believe workforce education should be the beginning of the process and not the end of it. We need to build capability from within. Educate the broader workforce so people understand the fundamentals. Help them apply that education around the realities of their roster. Then identify the people from within that workforce who want to develop a deeper understanding. People who know the roster, people who know the workplace, know the culture. And importantly, they know exactly what it feels like to work those particular shifts in that place. Develop those people. Give them structured education and support their own practical application. Champion them. Give them appropriate boundaries and create the capability for that knowledge to remain within the organization long after I've walked out of the room. And that is the exact thinking behind the Shift Work Champions Enterprise Framework. It's not about turning employees into doctors, counselors, or sleep scientists. Far from it. I don't want to burden or add more responsibility onto shift workers already working in the environment. That would be counterproductive. It's not about replacing the leadership or the health professionals or the fatigue systems that you've already got in place or existing workplace support. It's actually about building a layer of internal shift work capability that no 24-7 organization has to date. And I think this conversation becomes even more important when budgets are tight because the natural response when money is tight is, oh, we can't afford that. And sometimes that is absolutely true. But before closing that door, I think there's another question worth asking. What are we already paying because we haven't addressed this? Go and have a look at your absences. Look at the overtime and backfill. Look at the fatigue reporting. Look at retention. Look at what your workers are actually telling you in your feedback. Look at the people dragging themselves through nights. Go and have a look at them as they're leaving. Look at the supervisors dealing with the consequences. Listen to them. And look at the support that you are currently providing them and ask, have we actually taught these people how to shift work? Not how to do their job, because we've done that. How to manage the biological reality of doing that job at the times we're asking them to do it? Because those are two extremely different things. And if the answer is no, perhaps the conversation shouldn't begin with, what will the education cost us? Perhaps it should begin with what might our current lack of shift work capability already be costing us? Because that's the conversation that I personally want to start inside 24-7 organizations.

Executive Brief And Strategy Session

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And this is my mission. So if you are listening to this as a leader, a well-being professional, a safety professional, someone from HR or People and Culture, or you're someone who is responsible for a 24-7 workforce, I've put together an updated executive brief on the Shift Work Champions Enterprise Framework. And I encourage you to have a look at it. It explains the challenge, the potential hidden organizational costs, the missing layer in traditional shift work support, and how we can begin with workforce education and progressively build sustainable internal capability. You have the opportunity here to become world-leading 24-7 organizations. You'll find the link in the show notes. Download the executive brief, have a read, and then let's have a shift work strategy session about your organization, your workforce, and where the impact of shift work may already be showing up. Because just because you're not spending the money on shift work education, it does not mean that you are saving it. The investment is visible, the cost of doing nothing often isn't. And maybe it's time we started putting both sides of that equation on the same page. It doesn't have to be this way.

Share The Message And Close

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Share it with a colleague, a manager, a friend, a leader, or someone who has the opportunity to improve the lives of people working in a 24-7 environment. Because real change starts with awareness. And awareness changes conversations. And conversations change organisations. And organizations change lives. So thank you for spending this time with me. And until next time, I want you to remember this. It doesn't have to be this way. Take care of yourself and take care of each other.