The impact of organizational justice on centralized labor scheduling: a qualitative study with patient care staff

This study aims to explore the role of organizational justice in the dissatisfaction with centralized staff scheduling and automation processes.

A large-scale implementation of centralized scheduling and automation across three hospitals (one small and two medium-sized facilities) was investigated. While the effort was successful in identifying higher-quality nurse schedules that were better mapped to demand expectations, the project suffered from low staff support and staff satisfaction. Scheduling decisions were more objective, but nurse satisfaction did not significantly improve and became an inhibiting factor. Using reflexive thematic analysis, this paper utilizes actual structured interview feedback from the nurses and supporting staff to investigate the underlying causes of staff hesitancy and resistance.

The analysis of participants' feedback revealed three themes indicating dissatisfaction with organizational justice for scheduling: relationship changes, perception of loss of flexibility and perception of loss of human contact/communication. These themes indicated a negative perception of procedural justice or employee dissatisfaction with the procedures and methods used for the development of schedules and a negative perception of distributive justice or dissatisfaction with the fairness of outcomes.

The research was conducted in three non-teaching hospitals, and the findings may not be the same in other types of hospitals with different environments.

Automation and centralization are becoming more commonplace in the workplace. More employee communication must be implemented, particularly at the onset, to overcome resistance to technological and/or process changes and achieve organizational justice. Leaders must also consider the "human touch" factor, which may be lost with relationship changes due to automation and centralization.

This is the first study we are aware of that addresses dissatisfaction from centralized scheduling and automation, linking the causes to organizational justice.