Shift Workers

Greetings all!

I can't remember if I wrote a post about careers involving shift work and any pros/cons but I was thinking about it and figured I could do a mini list.

It will be useful for those who are thinking of going into careers that will have weird working hours, like nursing, doctor/medicine, policing, pilots, flight attendants, chefs etc, just to name a few. This is my first hand experience with shift work.

In this case I'll use the field of nursing as an example. There are many paths to nursing, and not all paths will require you to work all types of hours. Day Surgery involves shifts during the day/late afternoon, but you get the nights off, and weekends as well. If you work in clinics, many of them are day shifts, but rarely nights. If you go onto medical floors like general medicine, medical-surgical, intensive care units, cardiac units, transplant, you will be expected to work all types of hours: days, evenings, nights, and will require you to work every other weekend.

The great thing about working in ICU and all the medical units is that you will get a lot of hands-on experience, and gain a lot of knowledge. The one thing you have to be careful of is burn out. It takes a toll mentally and physically every time you work.

But speaking of burn out, I believe a lot of places have a high risk of burning out because 1) many more sick people now 2) short on funding 3) results in cutting back on essential services 4) burn out on staff.

The career that I chose mostly involves rotation between days/evenings shifts, and the rare moment of having nights as well. On-calls are also every 2-3 months, working every other Saturday while having every Sunday off. It's not too bad actually.

Now onto the pros of working this shift work hours:

1) The moment of shopping at off-peak hours. This really helps with Christmas shopping for example. Instead of going on a weekend (where there are much bigger crowds), you can avoid it and go on a weekday when you're off work. Much more peaceful and you can get a lot more done instead of fighting in the crowds.

2) Taking vacation whenever you want. You can avoid the high-seasons like summer time, March break, winter break and go whenever you like. In the long run, you'll end up saving quite a bit if you avoid going at high-peak seasons and paying a premium.

3) Getting paid time and a half (or double time in some cases) on holidays, and your birthday (depending on your employer).

4) Switching shifts with coworkers. If you feel that you can't work a certain day or week, there is always a coworker willing to do a switch with you to accommodate your needs. If it's really necessary, managers can work with you to accommodate scheduling.

5) You get premium pay working evening/night shifts on top of your hourly, as well as being on call and getting called in to work.

6) Flexibility. It sounds weird because you think shoot, you basically work all hours. It's impossible to be flexible! But it's true. There is always someone willing to take a shift, so you can always work around it in order to get things done.

7) You can avoid seeing someone you don't like. This one's a bit mean, but the chances of you working with someone you don't like goes down since there are many more hours to work around instead of a straight 9-5 job.

8) More chances of OT. You can bring in the kaching kaching. Ultimately, there is a higher chance of bringing in more cash.

Now onto the Cons:

1) It will mess up your biological clock. Studies have shown those who don't get enough sleep at night will have increased risk of heart disease. There are times that when I have trouble adjusting to my sleep patterns, I don't feel good overall. I feel like crap actually. This is true with those doing straight night shifts. Eventually you get used to it but initially, it is tough to adjust.

2) Say goodbye to your holidays, summers, and having nightly cocktails with your girlfriends. Shift work pretty much means you won't be able to have many nights out (unless you change your shifts around). Christmas and New Year's become the busiest time of year at work, and depending on employer's, some will not allow shift giveaways during these 2 weeks. So going away to Cuba or Florida at this time is almost impossible.

3) Sacrifice. Each job no matter where you end up will require some sort of sacrifice. I find that it still takes a bit of sacrifice from friends, family, just spending time with loved ones. Just have to be careful of balance between work life and loved ones.

4) It will always seem like you're working. Yes it's true to some degree. And when you finally get a day off, you just hope you stay in bed all day and have no one disturb you. But then you'd want to do as much as you can on your day off. You never win.

5) You will feel like you never get paid enough. Then again, that's with any job.

These are the main ones I can think of (there are probably more). This isn't written to scare people away, but more or less to give a head's up of what to expect. Overall, it's actually not that bad. But the biological clock is true, and to this day I still struggle to some degree.