Effective Absence Management: Strategies for a Healthier Workplace
Managing employee absences is one of the most challenging aspects of running a small business. Unplanned absences disrupt the day-to-day running of your business, impact your team morale, damage your bottom line and is a problem that’s becoming more and more widespread.
A recent report shows that in the UK, there’s been an increase of 55% in sickness absence rates since 2019 with each business recording an average of 128 sick leave days in 2023, up from 81 days in 2019.
With workplace absence becoming more and more of an issue, and with its impact being so wide ranging it’s essential to have effective absence management strategies in place to maintain productivity and create a healthy workplace environment. In this article, we'll explore practical strategies you can implement to manage absences more effectively and promote well-being among all your employees.
Understanding Absence Management
What is Absence Management?
First, let’s define absence management. In short, absence management is all about the policies and procedures you, as an employer, need to implement to handle employee absences efficiently. It encompasses everything from tracking attendance to implementing strategies that reduce unnecessary absences.
While looking at definitions, it’s helpful to break out the types of absence you might see in your business, as each requires a different strategy to be managed well.
Authorised Absences: These include scheduled leaves like annual holidays, maternity or paternity leave, and agreed time off for appointments.
Unauthorised Absences: These are instances where employees fail to report to work without prior approval.
Short-term Sickness: This happens when your team experiences minor illnesses or injuries, typically lasting less than seven days.
Long-term Sickness: Extended periods of absence due to serious health conditions.
The Most Common Causes of Absenteeism
When you’re looking to manage absenteeism and implement effective strategies to stop it, it’s essential to understand why your employees are absent from work.
The most common reasons for absenteeism include:
Health Issues: Your team members might be experiencing physical illnesses or chronic health conditions that prevent them from showing up to work, sometimes at short notice.
Mental Health: Stress, anxiety, or depression can have a significant impact on an employee's ability to work effectively.
Workplace Factors: Poor working conditions or conflicts with colleagues.
Personal Reasons: Your team may have complex family or caring commitments or face family emergencies or personal obligations that prevent them from turning up to work as expected.
The Impact of Absenteeism on Small Businesses
Persistent, unplanned absenteeism can significantly impact your business financially, operationally, and legally.
Unmanaged absenteeism can lead to significant financial burdens for your business. You might be paying increased overtime to other staff to cover the shifts of your absent employee. Or you’ll have to take on the additional cost of hiring temporary staff to fill gaps in your team, deal with reduced productivity, and perhaps deal with the financial implications of missing project deadlines as you don’t have the staff to fulfill your commitments.
Having team members missing puts strain on your staff members who take on the additional workload, which can lead to burnout. Absenteeism can also negatively impact your team’s motivation and cohesion, which can have far-reaching implications, impacting service quality and staff retention.
Then, there are the legal implications of absenteeism. As an employer, you must pay SSP to eligible employees, and non-compliance with laws like the Equality Act 2010 can have damaging legal consequences.
How To Develop An Effective Absence Management Policy
Key Components
With absenteeism having the potential to impact your business negatively, it’s essential to have an effective absence management strategy in place, which should include:
Plans for Promoting Employee Wellbeing and Engagement
Policies for Handling Long-Term and Frequent Absences
Information on Disciplinary Procedures
Training Opportunities for Team Leaders and Managers
Procedures for Monitoring and Recording Absences
Mechanisms for Gathering Feedback
Promoting Employee Well-being and Engagement
Implementing an effective wellness programme in your business can help prevent absenteeism. Consider offering your staff fitness classes or mindfulness sessions. You can also provide access to counselling services or employee assistance programmes.
Promote a healthy work environment by encouraging regular breaks and providing your team with ergonomic workstations. You could also consider whether remote work options suit your business and allow employees to work from home when possible. Another option to promote employee wellbeing is to offer adjustable start and finish times to accommodate personal commitments.
In addition to improving employee well-being, your absenteeism strategy can also improve employee engagement. Your plan should include fostering an inclusive and supportive workplace, acknowledging good attendance and contributions, encouraging feedback, and promptly addressing employee concerns.
Have A Plan For Handling Long-Term and Frequent Absences
A key element of your absence management strategy should be a plan for dealing with long-term and frequent absences.
You’ll need to ensure a supportive approach and a rehabilitation programme are in place to help employees return to work after long-term illness.
You’ll also need to consider occupational health referrals and understand how your business can benefit from professional assessments to support employee health and ensure you are in line with legal requirements. You’ll also need to plan to modify your returning staff member's duties or work environments to accommodate their health needs.
Communicate The Consequences of Excessive Absenteeism
An essential part of your absentee management strategy is ensuring employees clearly understand the consequences of unauthorised absences.
You’ll also need to implement fair disciplinary procedures when dealing with frequent, unexplained absences.
Offer Your Managers Training in Absence Management Best Practices
Having managers in your business who model good attendance and punctuality is essential to fostering good employee attendance patterns. It is key to ensure that they lead by example and demonstrate commitment to absence management policies.
You can help by providing resources and training programmes to equip your leaders to handle absences sensitively. Training sessions should include guidelines on conducting return-to-work interviews, how to build a supportive work environment, and how to encourage managers to be approachable and understanding. Good training will also enable your managers to recognise signs of stress or dissatisfaction in your teams and help them take early preventative action.
Have Systems in Place To Monitor and Record Absences
Once you implement your absence management strategy it’s important to monitor your results as well as record absences.
You can use specialist HR software and digital tools to track attendance and identify absence patterns so you can adjust your strategy or initiate any necessary interventions.
And, to support your policies it’s important to keep records of all absences, communications, and meetings so you’ll need to ensure you have the right documentation systems in place.
Another system that is very useful to have in place to support your strategy is a feedback mechanism. This allows you to collect insights on workplace satisfaction either through confidential one on one meetings or through anonymous online systems.
Communicate Your Strategy
Once you have developed your absence management strategy and implemented it in your business, it’s vitally important that you communicate the policies to your team.
You’ll need to ensure that your policies are easily accessible to everyone who works for you, and that your employees are informed about any changes. Running training sessions for all your employees to outline your absence management policies can be a great way to ensure the key elements of your strategy are understood across the business, and not just by the managers.
Ensure Compliance with UK Employment Laws
And finally, you’ll need to check that your absence management strategy is set out in accordance with the Equality Act 2010 to ensure your policies don’t discriminate against employees with disabilities.
You’ll also need to address data protection legislation and ensure that you handle your employee’s personal health information confidentially.
Health and Safety regulations also need to be complied with and you’ll need to ensure that your workplace doesn’t contribute to health issues.
To Sum Up
Good absence management is more than just keeping an eye on employee attendance; it's about creating a supportive environment that promotes your employees health and well-being.
As a small business you can reduce absenteeism and enhance productivity by implementing clear absence management policies, fostering open communication, and investing in employee engagement and creating a healthier workplace your employees enjoy working in.
But knowing where to start with designing and implementing your policy can be hard and time consuming, especially as you need to comply with complex legislation. But if you feel it’s time to prioritise effective absence management please drop me a line to see how I can support you and your business.