June 2013
Intermediate to advanced
288 pages
8h 12m
English
Most public services are required to meet a weekly demand that varies over time in an uneven manner, often over all seven days of the week and 24 hours a day. The personnel available to match this demand profile must of necessity have overlapping shifts since no individual expects to work continuously over the week. This is unlike the private sector, in which work requirements are generally uniform, with a fixed “nine-to-five” workday that coincides exactly with the availability of personnel.
Examples involving public services are not hard to provide. It suffices to mention sanitation workers, police officers, ambulance drivers, nurses in a hospital, security guards, emergency work crews, airport baggage ...