As the title says I am in need of designing a schedule for 5 day work week 2 shifts 10 hour each.4 mechainics,2 welders and 2 electricians per shift, 1 supervisor to rotate with each shift and work 4 10's as well with 2 fill in supervisors "One of which may be 1 of the 8 workers on that shift to make it even more difficult" to fill in for regular supervisors1 day per week per shift off. need it to work out so all will work 40 hours a week and there will always need to be a minimum 3 mechanics and 1 each electrician and welder scheduled for all 5 days.I think a rotating day off every week is the most fair way also, example would be monday off this week next week one would get tuesday off and so forth.need to cover 2 shifts 5 days a week with the numbers listed above. I am not good at designing things like this and tried many searches online to no avail unless I want to hire a company to design or buy a schedule.Does anyone have any ideas to make this scenario work? Need to have it figured out before the first of the year when the company goes to a 5 day 2 ten hour shift work week.

I'd like to hear more about this supervisor who fills in positions. Until then here is what I came up with without him factored in. Just shift the people down the list so guy 1 becomes guy 2 the next week.

Ok I just figured out what you meant, I think, is this what you want or do both of those fill in's somehow need 40 hours in too?

Not bad for a fast and easy schedule, I like it, but if I may ask ?Not sure of his companies responsibilities, but what of vacations, sick, jury duty, training days and such ? If they have these issues, this has to be considered. Is there any possibility of the employees working weekends ?If there is overtime, and for extended periods, this can increase payroll issues and such.Also, is this just the basic or will / can the company afford an extra person to cover at will ? Anyway to find out all the parameters to consider ?

I'd like to hear more about this supervisor who fills in positions. Until then here is what I came up with without him factored in. Just shift the people down the list so guy 1 becomes guy 2 the next week.

Ok I just figured out what you meant, I think, is this what you want or do both of those fill in's somehow need 40 hours in too?

At this time the company just presented to the union the option and offer to have hourly employees apply for fill in supervisor positions. we will see where this goes. but yes all will need 40 hours a week obviously hourly people need to work or have 40 hours accounted for and salaried people will always work a wee bit more than 40 but to make it fair to just say they work 4 tens as well. If the union deal falls through then other salaried people will have to be fill ins to relieve regular supervisor 1 day a week.

Not bad for a fast and easy schedule, I like it, but if I may ask ?

Not sure of his companies responsibilities, but what of vacations, sick, jury duty, training days and such ?

That is the reason for needing the set # on per day for vacation only if others are sick or gov related absences then we just go short by that many

If they have these issues, this has to be considered.

Is there any possibility of the employees working weekends ?

Yes but that is automatic overtime for them and there will be a different on call supervisor unrelated to this schedule

If there is overtime, and for extended periods, this can increase payroll issues and such.

Also, is this just the basic or will / can the company afford an extra person to cover at will ? company will not hire anyone else just to cover will come from current work force be it hourly or salaried.

Anyway to find out all the parameters to consider ?

I guess I mean do the fill ins need 40 hours? I can't make that work at all. You say they only fill in 1 day a week which works out but there doesn't seem to be a way to give 2 fill ins 40 hours each.

The tricky part will be trying to figure out how to schedule this if per say 1 electrician becomes a fill in. There still needs to be one available to work.

--- Update to the previous post...

I guess I mean do the fill ins need 40 hours? I can't make that work at all. You say they only fill in 1 day a week which works out but there doesn't seem to be a way to give 2 fill ins 40 hours each.

Yes everyone needs 40 hours. The fill in time would be counted towards the 40. There are no part time workers here all are full time 40 hour workers salaried and hourly employees. We have to work with the #'s available unless the union deal for hourly workers doesn't pan out then other salaried employees from non related department would have to fill in.

Are you saying out of the 8 workers, 1 of them will be a supervisor/fill in? So this whole schedule needs to revolve around 8 people? That would be entirely doable I just need to figure out exactly what your scenario is. I was thinking there were a few other people being supervisors who just happened to be able to do the other work.

I retired from the oil industry and we had 10's and 12 hour shifts. I never thought I would have to remember all this now. I would like to recommend your union seek out info from that industry. They changed unions since I was there, so they will have to do a bit of looking. They or the IBEW unions (they are in the refineries) should be able to get you schedules showing this. They spent a lot of time about 20+ years ago changing over to the schedules.

I see one flaw in the graph, you need to take one supervisor off this. There are 2 shifts each with the other people being correct. There needs to be 2 seperate overlapping but seperate graphs for 2 crews to cover, one supervisor per crew, each crew is made up of what you have on the graph minus 1 supervisor.

I'm gonna guess at this cause I'm on a roll with messing around with spreadsheets so if I am right, maybe this will work. The blue ones are fill ins/supervisors.

Are you saying out of the 8 workers, 1 of them will be a supervisor/fill in? possibly yes. So this whole schedule needs to revolve around 8 people? yes it revolves around 8 hourly employees plus 1 full time supervisor and on fill in day for regular super one may be from the 8 That would be entirely doable I just need to figure out exactly what your scenario is. I was thinking there were a few other people being supervisors who just happened to be able to do the other work. there would be if the union deal falls through or if hourly man power needed calls for it

responses in red

you still need to remove 1 supervisor from the above sheet as I posted a couple posts above.

--- Update to the previous post...

I retired from the oil industry and we had 10's and 12 hour shifts. I never thought I would have to remember all this now.

I would like to recommend your union seek out info from that industry. They changed unions since I was there, so they will have to do a bit of looking. They or the IBEW unions (they are in the refineries) should be able to get you schedules showing this. They spent a lot of time about 20+ years ago changing over to the schedules.

it just so happens to be an IBEW local, its at a coal mine and they also run at all the local coal fired power plants. I am no longer in the union now that I just got promoted to management as a shop foreman a few months ago.

Alright I think I got it figured out. The 10's with strikethroughs mean they are able to be a fill in/supervisor. So if this week the supervisor had thursday off, that means either welder or any 1 mechanic would be able to serve as the super's replacement. You could simply say which person needs to be the replacement but for now I'm just showing you all the options.

makes sense, could you try this scenario, say just 1 mechanic or just 1 electrician but not both are selected for these positions. I would think that if they were offset from supervisor by 1 or 2 days it would work.

I guess I don't know what you're wanting. If it were on this schedule then only the mechanic could do it because the electrician would sacrifice the position which would leave no electricians. Everything would have to be shifting around to give everyone a fair chance, unless just 1 mechanic is fit to be a super. If just 1 electrician and just 1 welder were fit as well, then it would get interesting but narrow down the people who were able and you would probably always be left with just that 1 person so you wouldn't have to really choose. But I am still a little confused by exactly what you are wanting.

I guess I don't know what you're wanting. If it were on this schedule then only the mechanic could do it because the electrician would sacrifice the position which would leave no electricians.

Everything would have to be shifting around to give everyone a fair chance, unless just 1 mechanic is fit to be a super. If just 1 electrician and just 1 welder were fit as well, then it would get interesting but narrow down the people who were able and you would probably always be left with just that 1 person so you wouldn't have to really choose. But I am still a little confused by exactly what you are wanting.

from what I underlined You get the point I am trying to make now. They have to apply for these positions internally so if it comes down to only one of any of these people being qualified per shift that is what I wanted to see. I realize there are scenarios that an outside super would have to fill on ocassion like if main super was off and fill in electrician was off leaving no others to fill in. I think that if the fill in was offset just one day from main super it would work for a fill in.

I think it could easily be figured in if you knew who was qualified. I obviously just guessed that all of them were qualified but if you only had a few then you could adjust their schedules accordingly. All comes down to planning really, the welder's and electrician's schedules are very flexible, whereas the mechanic is a little more strict since you always need 3 and only one might be qualified. Changing the mechanics schedule to meet the needs would change the other mechanic's schedules.

I think it could easily be figured in if you knew who was qualified. I obviously just guessed that all of them were qualified but if you only had a few then you could adjust their schedules accordingly. All comes down to planning really.

Yep I agree I can work with the one you posted above and modify from there, I appreciate this a lot thanks a bunch. What program are you using to do this with?

No prob, if you need more help, keep posting lol. Excel of course! http://www.mopar1973man.com//isx97/Excel/Excell.JPG

Schedule.xls