Posting Schedule

Every hospital, clinic, out patient surgery setting, etc., has different ways of scheduling.

By part time do you mean the same as PRN? Do you get benefits, a set number of hours per pay period? Or you just "extra" help and added to the schedule as needed no benefits, no guaranteed hours? That would make a difference.

However it really sounds unfair, even your co-workers must have a hard time dealing with knowing one week, or less, ahead what days they are going to work.

Scheduling is very hard. Your reply to my questions will give me more "wonderful' (ha ha) ideas of how to advise you.

I work in Same Day Surgery/PACU setting (meaning we cover both areas). I just received this past week my schedule out til second week of March. It includes my call time as well. I know which area I'm working in (opening, closing, pacu, pre anesthesia screening). I am able to make requests for shifts and days off, I work 4 days a week so not a whole lot of wiggle room but need to be fair to all so we get three "R" per schedule. Now the previous placed I worked at I was also 4 days a week however sometimes I was mandated to work 5 days. There were times it was 7pm before I knew what time I would have to be in to work the next day which could be as early as 4:30am! (Currently the earliest we come in at my new hospital is 6am). Also I never knew when my day would be over and it wouldn't be uncommon to work 9-12 hour days and call rotation was waaaay more. 1-2 times a week vs now I'm 1-2 times a month maybe and every 13th weekend. Also if our ICU isn't busy they may do after hour recoveries as well which helps out. Also we don't do c section recoveries where previously I did an was almost guaranteed to be called in to recover one. Sorry to be so long winded. Hope that helps :)

Every hospital, clinic, out patient surgery setting, etc., has different ways of scheduling.

By part time do you mean the same as PRN? Do you get benefits, a set number of hours per pay period? Or you just "extra" help and added to the schedule as needed no benefits, no guaranteed hours? That would make a difference.

However it really sounds unfair, even your co-workers must have a hard time dealing with knowing one week, or less, ahead what days they are going to work.

Scheduling is very hard. Your reply to my questions will give me more "wonderful' (ha ha) ideas of how to advise you.

Thank you for your response. I am part time here, receiving benefits and work three days per week. I work per diem at a hospital. Per out union contract there, our schedule comes out at least 4 weeks in advance. My last outpatient part time job I had a set schedule so did not deal with this. The people that work 5 days a week at my job don't really care as much since they know they will be there all five days. But myself and the other part timer find this very difficult. She actually resigned last week because of it.

So we don't know what days we are working until 5-7 days before or what times (shifts range from 6a-2p all the way to 9a-5:30 p and when closing you are often stuck there until 6 or 7p). I always feel anxious having no clue what days/times I need child care for and can never plan ahead.

Marz, thank you for your response! I am so jealous of how organized you outpatient facility is in terms of scheduling!! Haha! Seriously though, I do not understand why we can't know ahead of time like that or at least a month out. We have the same doctors each week on the same specific days so it's clear which days more staff is generally required. And wow!!...This is hard enough, I could not imagine finding out the night before!!

Sounds like your bosses, or the scheduler, don't care very much since they "allowed" the other part timer to go. I hope, assume, she told them why she was leaving.

I don't remember how early the schedules came out where I've worked.

I worked full time at a smallish out patient surgery clinic for 5 years. We rotated shifts, 4 weeks we were 6 - 2:30, 4 weeks you were 6:30 to 3, 4 weeks 8 to 4:30, 4 weeks 10 to 6:30, plus a few other various shifts in between the early and late ones. That was real nice to know when you were going to be the early nurse or the late nurse for 4 weeks at a time.

Then I went per diem to a large out patient surgery clinic. It took them, and me, a while to sort things out, and who did the scheduling changed several times. But the scheduler always knew who had child care needs, i.e., couldn't work certain hours, and was able to accommodate them. Every scheduler made an effort to keep the staff happy! For a while I simply told the scheduler I just wanted to be scheduled Mon., Wed., and Fri. but it didn't matter what shift I worked so that part didn't affect me.

As I said I don't think who ever does your scheduling cares? Unless you could get all your co-workers to unite and ask for the way the schedule is done to be changed. It would be ideal if you came up with a few concrete ideas, "solutions" instead of just complaints.

Scheduling staff is extremely hard.

Sounds like your bosses, or the scheduler, don't care very much since they "allowed" the other part timer to go. I hope, assume, she told them why she was leaving.

I don't remember how early the schedules came out where I've worked.

I worked full time at a smallish out patient surgery clinic for 5 years. We rotated shifts, 4 weeks we were 6 - 2:30, 4 weeks you were 6:30 to 3, 4 weeks 8 to 4:30, 4 weeks 10 to 6:30, plus a few other various shifts in between the early and late ones. That was real nice to know when you were going to be the early nurse or the late nurse for 4 weeks at a time.

Then I went per diem to a large out patient surgery clinic. It took them, and me, a while to sort things out, and who did the scheduling changed several times. But the scheduler always knew who had child care needs, i.e., couldn't work certain hours, and was able to accommodate them. Every scheduler made an effort to keep the staff happy! For a while I simply told the scheduler I just wanted to be scheduled Mon., Wed., and Fri. but it didn't matter what shift I worked so that part didn't affect me.

As I said I don't think who ever does your scheduling cares? Unless you could get all your co-workers to unite and ask for the way the schedule is done to be changed. It would be ideal if you came up with a few concrete ideas, "solutions" instead of just complaints.

Scheduling staff is extremely hard.

Thank you for the info and advice! The rotating schedule sounds organized and fair as well! I guess things are complicated here because we have a few people working 10 hour shifts and everyone else is 8 hour shifts. The tens are lucky in that they always are scheduled for the same times. Its extremely high turnover too which doesn't help, as of course we are consistently understaffed due to it. I have been there four months and I am third in seniority... Yikes. We have a clinic coordinator (like a charge nurse I guess..) and an administrator. The coordinator is supposed to do the scheduling, but the admin comes along and makes changes.

The other part timer actually didn't plan on resigning. She had gone to the administrator to discuss scheduling. She was recently diagnosed with a health issue requiring infusions and needs to make appointments ahead of time of course. She was told that the schedule can not come out earlier and requests are not guaranteed and actually put her down the next week for a specific day she requested off. So she resigned and the admin is fully aware of why.

I think you are right that a plan is required, not complaints, as obviously they don't care because they've heard it before. But I think she also will not care if I came up with ideas. I've never experienced this and the consistent turnover seems to show that others don't care for it much either. Stinks, because I like the job itself.

Trust me where I came from before my current place it was chaos!! But I agree I know with surgery there could be variables like emergency cases, equipment failure etc but you have an idea of surgeon block times and anesthesia providers or any reps needed (ortho). I think it's important with work life balance for them to have some what of an organization. It's not perfect but I know our charge nurse and manger tries. We have 14 staff, most are 4 days a week, we have one that's 3 days a week and another that's 5 one week and 4 another so that helps with staffing and wiggle room. Good Luck!

It seems the "lucky" people with the 10 hours shifts and regular schedules are really messing it up for everybody else! Perhaps they should be told 10 hours shifts aren't working out for everybody else.