Shift is a term used when defining the cycle schedule details. The Shift field is available to each cycle row but it is relevant only to one or a few rows (normally corresponding to the weeks covered by the cycle).
The shift points to what is regarded to be the allowed starting point (or points) of the cycle. The starting point is of interest when the cycle is extracted in order to find out the actual working hours for a certain date.
Only cycle rows linked to a shift can be used as starting points. For example, in the Employee Schedules and Rules page, the List of Values for the Shift field will display the shifts defined for the current schedule cycle. When the shift is selected, the corresponding sequence number from the cycle is linked to the employee. This is then used when deriving the schedule information for the employee.
Most cycle schedules will have only one shift defined. This is true for simple cycles such as the one-week cycle, as shown below:
This cycle should have Monday (sequence #1) linked to a shift . All employees linked to this cycle schedule will have the same shift value assigned to them. In this case, an appropriate shift name could be something like Office Hours.
The shift value should be chosen so that the scheduler can match the correct shift to each employee. In the example above this is not important because there is only one shift to choose from when assigning the schedule to employees. However, in a multi-week shift schedule where two employees work the same cycle schedule but on different shifts, the naming should be considered.
Example of a two-week shift cycle schedule:
In this example there are two sequence numbers that are candidates for a shift value, the #1 and #8 sequences. If both shifts will be manned the same date, then we need to define shifts for both sequences. When naming the shifts we should be able to easily relate the employees to the correct shifts. Don't name the shifts after the working hours. Shift names such as "Morning" and "Evening" will not help. Try to use a name that relates to a group of employees, or a supervisor, or a foreman. For instance, #1 is "Team Q", and #8 is "Team Z". In case you have several parallel teams working the same shift cycles you need a more neutral shift name, e.g., "A-tour" and "B-tour".