Impacts of shift work, intervention strategies, and COVID-19: the workers’ perspective

Abstract

Shift work can have several impacts not only on the health and family and social life of the workers, but also at the organizational level. The literature has revealed that shifts involving night work and/or periods that are highly valued from a family and social point of view, such as weekends, are the most disruptive. In this paper, the results of an open-ended question about the experience of working in shifts and the impact that COVID-19 had on the lives of workers, at the time of data collection, have been presented and discussed. For that, the answers of 123 shift workers (98 involving nights and 25 without involving nights) were compared with the answers of 33 day workers. Negative impacts of working hours on health, family life as well as at the organizational level were reported mostly by shift workers. Reduction in working hours, teleworking, or flexible working hours were presented as some of the main strategies to reduce the effects of working hours. Finally, from the perspective of workers, COVID-19 has resulted in greater workload and greater work demands as well as causing family and health problems.