Passing the buck: Labor flexibility practices that transfer risk onto hourly workers

The goal of this article is to increase knowledge about the ways that front-line managers use scheduling practices to implement labor flexibility in low-skill, hourly jobs. Data come from a comparative study of 88 non-production jobs in 22 work sites in four industries (hospitality, retail, transportation, and financial services). The focus is on scheduling practices in part-time and full-time standard jobs that allow front-line managers to vary the number of hours employees work each week, the distribution of employees' hours across a week, and the number of employees scheduled for any hours week-to-week. The findings provide insight into the daily accountability requirements that press front-line managers to make quick adjustments to work schedules and the specific scheduling practices that enable them to do so. The discussion considers the extent to which these scheduling practices, like other labor flexibility practices, are implemented in ways that protect some workers from instability at the expense of others.