Workers in the UK could soon be able to sign themselves off sick for two weeks without a doctor’s note. The news comes as the British Medical Association (BMA) tries to cut down on wasted appointments and save GPs’ time. But whether an employee is off for a day or two weeks, absences have a big impact on business and reducing them is crucial if you want a productive workforce.
Our research has shown that absenteeism costs UK employers around £11billion a year – which works out as £600 per employee – so it’s very important that business owners recognise patterns of sickness in their workforce so that they can work to reduce it.
This isn’t to say you should ask your team to battle through when they are feeling unwell. Businesses should encourage employees to go home if they are ill and make it clear that coming in when they are unwell, with a potentially contagious illness, isn’t expected. Not only do they risk spreading the bug to the rest of the team, they’ll actually reduce their own level of productivity in the long run!
Keeping track of staff sick days can seem like a daunting task, especially when managing a big team. But the importance of understanding patterns in your team’s absences shouldn't be underestimated; it can play a crucial role in understanding how an employee is feeling and be the first step towards resolving the problem.
One way of maintaining an efficient workforce is to inject fun into the working day. BrightHR’s recent report found that people who enjoy their jobs take less sick days because they are happy, healthy and more productive. Whether it’s offering staff a dress down day, organising a team bake off event or encouraging your team to have fun entirely spontaneously; ensuring an element of fun can make a big difference.
Of the people we surveyed recently, 62 per cent of employees who had no sick days in the last three months experienced some sort of fun in the workplace, compared to 38 per cent of those who hadn’t. Whereas at BrightHR we’ve seen sickness rates reduced by 69 per cent in 12 months through the implementation of a culture dedicated to using spontaneous fun.
Employers need to recognise that absence and length of recovery often directly correlates to an employee’s wellbeing. They also need to acknowledge that the workforce is changing with around 75 per cent of it in the UK expected to be made up of millennials by 2025. This new generation of employees see work very differently.
Millennials act like consumers when thinking about jobs. They understand the job market. They can anonymously ‘shop’ online for their next role; they know how much they’re worth and the kind of working environment they can expect. This makes them much harder to keep on the payroll by traditional methods. You have to make them really want to work with you and love your company in the same way they love the brands they shop for. By taking this approach our staff turnover is currently 33 per cent lower than the national average.
Businesses around the country need to think about how they will cope with employees being able to sign themselves off for up to two weeks and the potential disruption that it could cause. However through the proper monitoring of absence, ensuring your team really want to be in their workplace and setting clear expectations for employees, it shouldn’t represent any more of an issue than businesses already face.
People respect what you inspect. Simply by implementing a system you can have a significant impact on productivity by reducing unplanned absences and sickness.
