At the end of a shift the remaining dispatch, tidying and records all try to fit into the same twenty minutes. Physical work is visible and urgent, while a record looks postponable; that order forms on every shift without anyone deciding it, and temperatures and times end up written as remembered values instead of measured ones. The form fills up but does not carry the real time.
The fix is to write the order down beforehand. Enter each reading and its time on the form or approved system at the moment you take it, and leave tidying to the end: let the broom wait, not the record. The last twenty minutes are for closing work already started, not for starting new work; a load begun at that hour spoils both itself and the handover, and often stretches the shift.
| Time left in the shift | What happens |
|---|---|
| 20 minutes | No new loading; started work is closed |
| 15 minutes | Last measurements on the form with the time they were taken |
| 10 minutes | Handover form: open tasks, owner, next step |
| 5 minutes | Tidying the area |
Work that will pass to the next shift is said so at the start and done in a way that can be handed on rather than abandoned: write its status, last step and next action. The handover form has to be short enough to fill in standing up; a long form that needs a desk does not get filled in during the last twenty minutes, so what it holds is incomplete.
The order above is an example, so adapt it to your site: for a few shifts write the start and finish times of dispatch, cleaning, records and handover and mark what was postponed, post the order on the board, and after a week compare late records and handover gaps and update it. A written order removes the need to make the same decision again every shift.
