The recent spell of good weather heralds the traditionally quiet summer period for commercial print work. This, combined with the ongoing effects of the downturn means summer 2009 is likely to be particularly quiet on the demand front, which caused my thoughts to turn to shift patterns. Boy do I need to be careful when typing that phrase.

Talking to one print boss the other day he bemoaned the fact that his business was hampered by inflexible working patterns that didn't adequately reflect the seasonal peaks and troughs of his company's workload. His view was that banked hours had to be the way forward. Another manager who happens to be in the magazine printing business would ideally like to run his factory for 7 days in the two busiest weeks of the month, and then three or four days a week for the rest of the time. But at the moment, that's not possible.

This made me wonder, how many printing companies have successfully implemented more flexible annualised or banked hours systems? I know of at least one printing company whose shift system was modelled from the outset on one deployed by a bakery, allowing them to run the factory for 363 days a year without overtime. I realise that such working methods don't provide a universal panacea - different shift patterns will suit different types of printing operation and there's no one-size-fits-all solution. But banked hours seems to be something that's talked about a lot, and if I recall correctly such flexibility featured in the Partnership at Work agreement between BPIF and Unite. However I'm not sure how many firms have had much joy actually putting things into practice.

I've picked up a vibe that Unite speaks with a forked tongue on this matter, and that such changes are met with resistance at grassroots, no doubt not unconnected to the fact that people tend to get very attached to their overtime. However, a reliance on overtime is as unhealthy as relying on credit cards to fund a lifestyle that's beyond the means of one's basic pay.

Speaking to companies that aren't restricted by historical union agreements, and where annualised hours arrangements have been in place from the outset, the feedback is that a lot of workers actually embrace such systems because they fit in really well with modern lifestyles.

Nobody involved in the world of work can be unaware that issues such as competitiveness, flexibility and the ability to ensure that a company's cost base is compatible with the available work are absolutely to the fore at the moment. As such, perhaps the downturn presents an opportunity for print companies to change the way they work by bringing outmoded shift systems into the 21st century.