Shift work in the Philippines in the cyber age

The start of the millennium marked the beginning of a new trend in shift work in the Philippines. In a rough and general sense, shift work is an employment practice that involves different work schedules or shifts aside from the usual “standard“ day shift (e.g., 8 a.m. – 5 p.m.). It is a mode of scheduling hours of work to ensure continuity in the service or production process. Shift work in the country has increased with the quick rise in the past 10 years of the business process outsourcing (BPO) industry which includes medical transcription, computer animation, software development, back office operation, human resource management services, other professional services and the biggest component — the contact center or call center sector.

The rising demand for shift workers in the country indicates positive economic effects. According to a study of the University of the Philippines Population Institute and the International Labor Organization in 2010, the booming BPO industry had expanded at a fast rate in the last decade, contributing revenue of $350 million in 2001 to $7.2 billion in 2009. In 2009 alone, the industry in the Philippines created more than 70,000 jobs and in 2010, it registered a total of 400,000 employees. It has been reported that the Philippines surpassed India as the leading BPO provider in 2010 in the pure voice-based revenue and it is predicted that the industry will continuously grow. The profile of shift workers is now dominated by workers in the BPO industry. In the past, shift work is more associated with workers in manufacturing and mining industries. There are also shift workers in establishments such as hotels, restaurants, shopping malls, entertainment businesses, security agencies, transport establishments, hospitals and health care industries. But nowadays, a shift worker in the Philippines is more likely an employee in a contact center.

The good economic effects of shift work are not without issues and concerns. High attrition rates have been observed among contact center employees and international studies have also shown that shift work affects employees’ health and well-being. In the Philippines, there are also local studies that looked into effects of shift work and potential health risks faced by shift workers. In a recent review (accessible at http://www.philsciletters.org/pdf/2012n1.4p4.pdf) of local studies on shift work from 2000 to 2011 by the PhilSHIFT Research Group, several findings have been noted and can be briefly summarized according to health, sleep quality and quantity, job satisfaction and performance, lifestyle and risk behaviors, legal aspects and other concerns. Many aspects of shift work have been explored in studies in the Philippines, but there is still a big gap in knowledge that needs to be addressed. While there are studies that investigated health effects, job satisfaction and other topics related to shift work, the study designs implemented and the number of studies done in the country are still quite limited to make conclusive generalization. In most of the studies done, one cannot simply assume causal relationships between factors and study outcome. There is still a need for more detailed studies to be able to provide empirical evidence on shift work’s effects on Filipino workers and to be able to make relevant interventions to improve the workers’ health and well-being.

Given the necessity of shift work in this cyber age, we need to use the latest scientific results to reduce health risks and improve the productivity of our shift workers. In this respect, it is important that the academic/scientific community and industries employing shift workers work together in field studies in order to have the basis for optimizing shift schedules to reduce health risk, minimize attrition and improve work productivity. There are still a lot that we need to know in the field of shift work in the local setting. In terms of research questions, there are no published local studies that looked into chronic diseases such as cardiovascular diseases and cancer in relation to shift work. There are also no published studies yet that investigated the Filipino chronotype in relation to shift work. The chronotype characterizes how an individual’s internal biological clock synchronizes to the external clock. The importance of chronotype in shift work research has been shown in studies in other countries. As a result of this, in the factory setting, initial recommendations for improved shift schedules based on chronotype and sleep analysis have been made. Among Filipinos, the chronotype variation is not even known. This is currently being investigated by the PhilSHIFT group. For more information about shift work, you may visit the PhilSHIFT Research Group website (http://philshift.upm.edu.ph/) and if you wish to know your chronotype and be a part of the Philippine chronotype profile, simply answer the PHILMCTQ questionnaire which is also accessible at the website.

PhilSHIFT is an interdisciplinary group of researchers from the University of the Philippines and the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München studying chronotype variation among Filipinos and shift work in the Philippines. It started a series of workshops to introduce researchers to chronobiology-based shift work research. The latest one was conducted last Feb. 10 at the Center for Integrative and Development Studies (CIDS) in the University of the Philippines Diliman. Anyone who is interested in such training/workshop may contact Gay Manalang Jr. (e-mail: [email protected]). Shift work research is now included in the National Unified Health Research Agenda (NUHRA) of the Philippine Council for Health Research and Development (PCHRD). PhilSHIFT is interested in collaborations for joint research projects to address this agenda.

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Jingky Lozano-Kühne is a biostatistician/epidemiologist. She is a senior health researcher at the Department of Public Health, University of Oxford and a member of the PhilSHIFT Research Group and the Forum for International Health. She was a former assistant professor at the University of the Philippines Manila and the coordinator and founding member of the Filipino Scholars and Alumni Association in Germany. E-mail at [email protected].