Assistance creating "fair" work schedule

[AzureToad]

At my workplace, we have 4 people that cover after-hours support, one week at a time, Wednesday PM through the next week Wednesday AM. With the new year coming soon, it's time to create a new schedule.

The issue we have with scheduling is that if we use a simple "A", "B", "C", "D" schedule, one person gets "stuck" covering month-end for 3 or 4 months in a row. Also, with the way holidays fall, one person seems to cover something like 5 of the 7 annual holidays.

This year I tried the schedule of "A", "B", "C", "D", "B", "C", "D", "A", "C", "D", "A", "B"... where the first in the group of four would drop to the last in the next group of four. Confusing, I know, plus that means people sometimes have a gap of nearly 2 months between shifts.

Does anyone have any suggestions on how to rotate 4 people with a weekly coverage so that month-ends and holidays are distributed?

[pl5bnsf]

Have you tried looking at not restricting it to full weeks? Try 5 or 6 day rotations or 8 days. More work to setup I bet but that would spread the holidays.

[Deozaan]

I'm not sure when the 7 holidays are, so I'm not sure if this helps with that, but perhaps you already considered a rotation like this for month-end distribution?

A B C D
C D A B
D C B A
B A D C
(repeat)

It means sometimes people will have only one week break before having to do it again, but that only happens 3 times a year for each person, and it will happen to everyone, so in that regard it's equally unpleasant for everyone. In theory this one seems fair to me, but in practice people might hate having to live it.

[AzureToad]

Have you tried looking at not restricting it to full weeks? Try 5 or 6 day rotations or 8 days. More work to setup I bet but that would spread the holidays.

-pl5bnsf (November 29, 2022, 11:55 AM)

Using something other than 7 days would cause the shift change to occur on a weekend at some point. That's a hard "no".

[AzureToad]

I'm not sure when the 7 holidays are, so I'm not sure if this helps with that, but perhaps you already considered a rotation like this for month-end distribution?

A B C D
C D A B
D C B A
B A D C
(repeat)

It means sometimes people will have only one week break before having to do it again, but that only happens 3 times a year for each person, and it will happen to everyone, so in that regard it's equally unpleasant for everyone. In theory this one seems fair to me, but in practice people might hate having to live it.

-Deozaan (November 29, 2022, 12:06 PM)

I'll give this rotation a shot - it looks like it just might work!
Thank you for the feedback