Challenges of a 24-HOUR SOCIETY.

• Position: Those who work at night might require additional health and safety considerations - Brief Article

All-night pharmacies, weekend banking, and 24-hour customer service are lifesavers for two-earner families with little time to spare during the workday. However, they are rough on the people who staff them. "We need to balance commercial opportunities with a concern for the social fabric," maintains Helen Wilkinson, a research associate at the Future Foundation, who worked on a British study which showed that workers are both victims and beneficiaries of the emerging global 24-hour society.

One-fifth of the global labor force reports to work at night, notes Ed Coburn, managing director of Circadian Information, and publisher of Working Nights newsletter. ]-hat takes a toll on health, relationships, productivity, and safety. "A lot of companies ... treat the night shift as just [an after-dark] version of the day shift. But it's not so. People aren't supposed to be awake at night and sleep in the day."

Still, he points out, round-the-clock shifts are a must in a global economy in which U.S. firms might have customers whose workday falls in the middle of the North American night. He advises employers to consider employees they might not think of as shift workers, including overnight security guards and janitors. "Lots of times, people don't realize they even have people working in their organizations 24 hours." Coburn warns that neglecting employees with odd...