Josh

I rushed my daughter to hospital at past 2am this morning. Needing to pay for lab tests and medication, I approached the cashier. This lady was sleeping comfortably, as though she was at home. I called her attention. She woke up briefly, mumbled a few words, and returned to sleep. It was hard. At some point, I decided to just stand and wait. She relaxed into her chair, dragged her duvet, and returned to what must have been blissful sleep. I stood there for 10 minutes weighing my options. Should I be angry and rant? Should I show empathy by understanding her situation? Eventually, the doctor was passing by and I reported to him. He approached her and she mustered the effort, albeit painfully, to finally attend to me. The doctor had been kind enough to proceed with emergency care for my child while I was sorting out the bills. Otherwise, we would have lost 15 minutes of valuable time to save a life, depending on what the ailment was. My daughter has been stabilised. We are still here. Hopefully, she will be fine. But, in between attending to my child and responding to passenger complaints on the time line and in my DM, I thought about that cashier and the attitude of night shift staff in a lot of businesses in our country. Something is not right. A night shift staff is expected to have taken care of sleep during the day. Take the hotels abroad, for example. The front desk staff are mostly not even allowed to sit. They stand all night behind their counters, attending to customers. And this practice cuts across a lot of other sectors outside hospitality. I can understand it if a doctor or nurse was catching a nap. Even they are expected to be alert, despite the tough nature of their jobs. But a cashier? I remember the number of times I have stayed in hotels here, where the 'receptionist' would bark at guests for disrupting their sleep because they needed something. "Why are you sleeping on duty in the first place?" "Oga, am I not a human being? Is this not night? Are you not supposed to be asleep yourself?" This is the most common retort I have heard. Then comes the gaslighting when you report to management. "You lack empathy, oga. Do you not feel for him/her? You can sleep, but you don't want another person to sleep?" I detest this. It is called SHIFT for a reason. That is your duty time. That is when you are supposed to do your job. An Egyptian front desk officer at the Pullman in Dubai, told me in 2018 when I asked why they had no chairs, that they are only allowed to walk around the lobby when they felt sleepy. But seats are not provided so that they don't get too comfortable on duty. That way, customers are guaranteed prompt attention when they need it. We must build a system of monitoring our on-duty personnel. At the NCAA, we are in the final stages of automating that process in my department. I do not want a situation where passengers are stranded at night, and our CPOs who are meant to be on duty would be answering my calls from home while claiming to be at the terminal. With automation, I can see where they are, real time. We must embrace a work culture that places the highest possible standards on night-shift staff. Those are crucial hours where time should not be lost. Customers/patients are most vulnerable at night, and should be guaranteed efficient and speedy attention. There is no emotional perspective to this. Work, if you must do it, must be done well. Happy New Year.