Mondays - aren’t they the worst?
The weekend’s come and gone in no time at all and suddenly
it’s back to the grind for another long, arduous week of work. There’s no day
that drags on quite like Monday, so it’s no surprise to hear that it’s had the
largest absentee rate across the last six months of any weekday.
New findings from ELAS show that in the first half of 2017,
nine out of the ten days with the highest absences were all Mondays. The only
exception was on Tuesday 3rd January, which in turn also happened to be the day
with the most recorded absences. It’s hardly surprising considering that it was
the first day back at work for many people following New Year and the holiday
season.
Apparently getting back into the swing of things was
difficult for a lot of people as January makes up half of the top ten highest
absences, with the 3rd, 9th, 16th, 23rd and 30th all appearing on the list.
That included every Monday in the month, one of which was Blue Monday.
Referred to as the most depressing day of the year, it
generally falls on the third Monday in January and has often been associated
with high levels of absence. The day tends to be decided by a number of
factors, including the likelihood of people having failed their new year’s
resolutions, but despite still appearing in the top ten, its position at number
eight signifies that it’s no longer such a massive problem for employers.
Likewise, National Sickie Day, which occurred on Monday 6th
February, also posed less of an issue with its presence on the list down to
number six. However, 7am on this day was still the hour with the highest number
of sick calls so far this year.
In response to this, Enrique Garcia from ELAS said that:
“These statistics bring good news for employers in that
National Sickie Day appears to no longer exist. Of course, genuine absences
cannot be helped but frequent absenteeism, or sickies, is a problem that needs
to be tackled.
“It’s impossible to tell if it’s purely coincidental that
the absence rate on Mondays is so high or if people are taking advantage and
wanting to extend the weekend but this is the second year in a row that the
statistics have shown there is a pattern, which is something employers should
be aware of.”
It can be extremely difficult for employers to tackle
absenteeism, especially when it’s hard to know if people’s reasons are genuine
or not. There are systems that can be put in place which are able to track
potential patterns of absence, such as the regularity of someone taking a sick
day on a Monday. By identifying where cases like this are happening, employers
can take disciplinary action which should put people off calling in with fake
absences. Although this would not remove the problem, it would at least diminish
it.
Promoting a positive culture at work will also go a long way
to reduce the likelihood of frequent absences. No matter how much someone loves
their job, the day to day toil grows weary, which means a lot of effort needs
to go into ensuring that the office is an enjoyable place to be five days a
week. Daily incentives work well to give people something to look forward to,
such as a free lunch one day or a trip to the pub after work. Given Monday and
Friday normally have higher absence rates, set the best of these incentives at
the start and end of the week to try and sustain higher attendance levels.
If employees are taking sick days because they feel stressed
or overworked then communication with them is key. This will only happen if you
form and maintain a good bond with your staff so they’ll feel comfortable
admitting when things are becoming too much. Someone who’s suffering from too
much stress will not be productive in the workplace, and if this leads to them
taking days off then things will only grow worse. Building up a good rapport
with employees is not difficult, a positive comment here and a note of
appreciation there can go a long way. Your company will thrive because of it.
Whatever the reason for absences, it is up to you as an
employer to make the call. As ELAS employment law consultant Emma O’Leary says,
“you are perfectly entitled to challenge the authenticity of an absence,” but
it’s best to try and target absenteeism in the first place before it gets out
of hand.
James Darvill
James
is a passionate scriptwriter and reluctant poet with a talent for the
dystopian. When he’s not staying up late watching the Simpsons he’s beating the
world at Mario Kart, always with a glass of wine in hand.
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