Summary: Absenteeism occurs when employees fail to turn up to their place of work as scheduled. Here we explain how to deal with it and how it affects pay.
Absenteeism occurs when individuals continually fail to attend work or other regular duties on a chronic basis. This usually happens without a valid reason, and in a working context, can negatively impact productivity, team morale, and overall output in a workplace.
Unlike planned time off due to annual leave, doctors’ appointments, or family emergencies, absenteeism can occur without warning, leaving businesses unable to adapt in time.
While factors like illness and sudden injuries are leading causes of absenteeism in the workplace, factors like stress and burnout at work can also lead to mental health challenges that may contribute.
According to a recent survey, 36% of US professionals feel burned out, and as a chronic condition, it can compound ongoing issues with absenteeism for businesses.
How Does Absenteeism Affect Businesses?
Today, absenteeism is one of the most disruptive challenges that businesses can face in terms of supporting productivity and reducing operational costs. Broken down, the impact of absenteeism on businesses includes:
Financial Impact
For businesses, absenteeism costs an average of $3,600 per hourly worker and $2,650 per salaried employee annually. This suggests that a company of 25 employees could incur losses between $66,250 and $86,400 each year.
The most direct financial impact of absenteeism is a loss of productivity, but other issues can emerge for businesses requiring replacement staff and from missing key project deadlines.
Wider Negative Impacts
Another major impact for businesses is the disruption caused by absenteeism among your present employees. Issues like burnout can be made worse as other workers cover for absent staff.
Due to this, employee morale can be adversely affected by absenteeism, while the quality of output among teams can decline significantly as staff struggle to cover additional responsibilities.
How to Tackle Absenteeism
Luckily, there are plenty of approaches that you can take to tackle absenteeism head-on, and possible strategies include:
Clear Company Policy
Make sure you have clear company policies in place to tackle absenteeism. While it can be tempting to introduce negative reinforcement measures to overcome unauthorized absences, workers struggling to overcome mental health challenges are more likely to respond positively to policies that reward consistent attendance.
Introduce Wellness Initiatives
Worryingly, surveys compiled by the US Department of Health and Human Services show that 76% of workers in the United States have reported at least one symptom of a mental health condition, while 84% claim that workplace conditions have contributed to at least one mental health challenge.
With this in mind, it’s essential that you create employee engagement and wellness programs to support your workers. These initiatives can promote more remote working opportunities, gym membership deals, and more visible mental health helpline information displayed throughout the office.
It’s also worth looking to level up your team-building exercises to build a positive working environment for all employees.
Legality and Ethics
Employees are entitled to a specific number of days off for vacation, medical issues, emergencies, and family responsibilities each year. If your workers remain absent beyond their allowed leave, they’re in breach of their contract and your company policy, meaning that you’re within your rights to take disciplinary measures that may result in dismissal.
Conclusion
Absenteeism is an issue that businesses face throughout the United States and can stem from workplace stress and mental health challenges among your workforce. As a result, tackling absenteeism requires a measured and sympathetic approach by employers.
However, steep cash flow shortfalls that stem from absenteeism mean that it pays to be proactive in creating initiatives to help employees improve their attendance rates.
FAQs
You have a duty of care to ensure the health and safety of your employee if they fail to turn up for work. Attempt to contact them using the details they’ve provided for you, including emergency contacts. You should also refer to any company policies you’ve created for handling unauthorized employee absences.
Tracking tools and digital systems provide greater visibility over employee attendance rates over time. You can also monitor unauthorized absences with the help of Employee Management Systems (EMS). It may also be worth creating surveys so that you can gain insights into why your employees are absent, which can also cover factors that affect their workplace satisfaction, family responsibilities, and medical issues.
While the most common cause for absenteeism involves mental health issues, other factors like workplace bullying, physical injuries, or disengagement at work can all contribute to unauthorized leave from employees.