How to Reduce Staff Absence

People are a business’s greatest strength but they can also be its major weakness. Employee absenteeism costs companies seven trillion dollars. Half the world’s workers admit to having a sick day due to lack of motivation. The absent colleagues also affect the workers still in post, as they have to perform extra tasks and become increasingly stressed.  The digital platform helps to break this pattern by improving the engagement of all staff.

What Is Disengagement?

Disengagement is not just a Human Resources issue. It needs to be taken seriously across the whole business.  Engaged employees feel valued and motivated by the sense of connection they feel with the company. This interest in their work increases productivity.

Disengaged employees don’t care about their job. They will perform with minimal effort. This apathy leads to lower productivity, lack of commitment, no motivation, frequent staff turnover and absenteeism. The disengagement means there is a sense of stagnation.  A few staff members are left to do the work of the slackers.  Another problem is that nobody comes up with new ideas or fresh ways of doing things. Quality of work suffers and the clients have a less favourable experience. Disengagement has a negative effect on staff morale. Nearly a quarter of employees who are off sick say they don’t want to come into work.

The Effect of Disengagement on Staff Absence

Disengaged employees who are off sick cost businesses an enormous amount of money.  Sick leave costs employers seven million pounds in the UK alone. Many staff take all their allocated sick days whether they need them or not which just makes the problem worse.

Absenteeism causes extra stress for the loyal remaining staff that are left with more work to do. Covering for others leads to staff losing their motivation resulting in lowered productivity. Previously loyal staff can start to take sick days too and the vicious circle continues.

How To Increase Engagement

Research suggests that companies with high staff engagement have 37% fewer cases of absenteeism than other businesses.  They perform better than their competitors by 202%.  Working out where your business falls on the spectrum of employee engagement can be achieved by looking at sickness absence figures and patterns of leave.

Making changes to company culture can decrease absenteeism. Such changes include:

• Sharing company goals with all employees.
• Celebrating achievements of workers and teams.
• Improving communication.
• Monitoring sick leave trends.

Many workers do not feel valued by their employers. Sharing the company vision with everyone leads to a feeling of being part of something bigger, which increases motivation. If employees receive no feedback about how they are doing they stop trying their best. Praise for a job well done leads to a happy worker who will give of their best.  All employees need to know exactly what they are supposed to be doing and how their role fits in with the company’s wider aspirations. Tracking an individual worker’s sick days can enable management to understand who is taking too many days off and find out the reasons for them, whether it be a genuine medical problem or a lack of motivation. Implementing effective communication measures will increase worker engagement.

Engagement as Everybody’s Mission

If you want your business to thrive you need to start thinking of engagement as a goal for everyone in the company, not just the Human Resources Department. If staff don’t feel valued their commitment wanes and this disengagement can lead to absenteeism, which affects the morale of the rest of the workforce.

Leave management software like WhosOff can help to break the cycle of apathy by analysing patterns of absence among members of staff.  Management can then put systems in place to improve employee engagement and then track its impact on absenteeism.

The ideal situation is a company culture where every staff member shares the vision for the business. Each employee feels valued and rewarded for his or her work. They want to come to work in the morning and look forward to a long and successful career with the company, taking few sick days.

What is HR KIT

HR KIT is a mobile employee engagement solution you can fit in your pocket. HR KIT can help your employees to feel part of something greater, increase their overall engagement in their work and feel proud to be a part of your company