Crew Management System: A Study among Loco-Pilots of Howrah Division, Eastern Railways

Abstract

The concept of occupation has become specific, specialized, and competitive with time. Locomotive Pilots (Loco-Pilots) are one such specific group tasked with operating the Locomotives in Indian Railways which power and haul the trains. The themes highlighted from the literature in the country context (which is mostly quantitative) talk about occupational stress, fatigue, noise noise-induced hearing loss among others. The literature also points toward duty and rest, frequency of duty, and crew management systems. Crew Management System is a software application which was introduced to streamline the scheduling and management. The objective of this study was to document and discuss this Crew Management System. Methodology: The research design was descriptive and the tools of questionnaire and semi-structured interview were used to collect data for quantitative and qualitative respectively. The sampling was been conducted purposively. The ethical considerations of informed consent and anonymity were put into place. Results: The Crew Management System made a contribution to scheduling and management and is better than the manual scheduling of the past. Although, initially there was an issue to learn the software and interface but now it is acceptable. There exist some operational problems, that in some stations the internet or link often is not stable thus operation of the CMS becomes difficult and sometimes it does not operate at its regular speed across devices. The CMS is a tool for the future that if monitored and enhanced with a further simplified user interface will provide direct benefits to crew scheduling and management.