Managing Absenteeism

Soraya Clements gives advice on cutting the costs of absence.

Every business is looking for competitive advantage - and one of the key differentiators in creating that advantage is people. Ultimately, your company's profitability depends on its people's performance. Yet. while people are your organisation's strength, they are also a source of risk, presenting a range of issues that can fundamentally affect your success.

Absenteeism contributes significantly to that risk, so managing attendance is essentially an employee risk management issue. Adopting best practice means treating attendance management or sickness absence as fundamental to the management of your people.

Absence attributed to sickness is a major and increasing cost for businesses. A recent Confederation of British Industry (CBI) survey estimated that UK industry loses 8.5 working days for each employee every year - a cost of more than £10 billion. Overall expenses associated with accidents and illness cost UK businesses £18 billion. Only £2.6 billion of this is recoverable through insurance.

What does sickness absence mean? From the occupational health viewpoint, it's more realistically termed "absence attributed to sickness". It is impossible to obtain concrete information on the percentage of absence that results from genuine medical conditions. However, it is clear that many factors, apart from the actual disease, determine the frequency and length of any sickness absence. These include the individual's resilience and personality, availability and suitability of treatment, domestic circumstances and the nature of the job.

As an employer, you obviously have little involvement in the condition's medical management. However, you can considerably influence other aspects by "social" management. Management commitment to controlling absence, including established disciplinary procedures, a recognised sickness absence policy, good statistics and flexibility on rehabilitation, substantially reduces sickness absence levels (source: Audit Commission 1993). This applies both to frequent short absences which, while possibly related to genuine illness, may be influenced considerably by other factors, and to long-term absence for recognised medical conditions, where the employer's active involvement in rehabilitation may produce mutually beneficial results.

Addressing the risks associated with sickness absence means reviewing and analysing strategy, cost, compliance and best practice. You need to identify any instances of inefficiencies, process breakdowns and policy avoidance/misalignment. This will help you to examine your company's current position.

Effective analysis requires input from employees in a number of areas, such as human resources/personnel, administration, payroll, occupational health and line management. Relevant information for review includes absence data, policy documentation, sick pay records, case histories of absence dismissals, samples of absence forms and records of the costs associated with absence. Carrying out this analysis will help you evaluate the specific causes for poor attendance and identify areas to address.

You need to assess the cost and non-compliance consequences of your current position and to take any appropriate remedial action. In order to measure the effectiveness of any attendance management initiatives that you introduce, you must also validate an appropriate cost methodology in advance.

You need to ask a number of questions in order to assess the effectiveness of your current policies and processes and to identify areas for improvement. These fall within 10 well defined areas, giving a suitable framework for ensuring best practice in attendance management.

Managing attendance is about managing employee risk - an increasing concern for many organisations. Failing to manage sickness absence is not humanitarian or paternalistic. It is quite the reverse. If employees feel that it doesn't matter whether or not they turn up for work, this considerably reduces their own sense of worth and the worth of their jobs. You need to show employees who give no priority to attendance at work that their attendance is important and that their absence is noted and unacceptable. Where there is genuine illness, a return to work interview and maintaining contact during absence demonstrate concern and consideration.

Commitment to attendance management allows you to adopt best practice and implement practical, cost effective solutions. In turn, these will result in increased employee performance, better productivity and enhanced profitability for your business and its shareholders.
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