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Posts Tagged ‘Absenteeism’

Sick days or personal days?

Thursday, November 3rd, 2011

Employers are often at a loss as to how to ensure employees who take sick days are really sick and not simply abusing the system. They are often scared to ask for doctor’s notes, but also scared that if they don’t, the abuse will become rampant. I often encourage employers to consider abandoning the notion of sick days altogether, and simply provide a fixed number of “personal days”, which eliminates the implicit or explicit requirement that an individual be sick in order to have time off.

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Tags: Absenteeism, abusing sick days, act of bad faith, Disability, discrimination, doctor's note, duty to accommodate, employment law, Honda v. Keays, managing absenteeism, personal days, policies and procedures, sick days, sick leave policy, time off to take care of personal responsibilities, vacation
Posted in Employee Relations, Employment Standards, Health and Safety, Human Resources, Privacy and Security | 3 Comments »

Tips to prevent the spread of colds and flu in the workplace

Wednesday, November 2nd, 2011

The cold and flu season is underway and typically runs from November to April each year. The often close quarters of workplaces allow employees to easily spread cold and flu germs. These germs are transferred from person to person and surface to surface indoors. Employers must take preventive measures to fight these germs around your workplace, keep your employees safe and maintain productivity throughout the peak cold and flu season.

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Tags: Absenteeism, Canadian Coalition for Influenza Immunization, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, colds and flu in the workplace, employment law, flu, germs, health, health benefit costs, influenza, Influenza Immunization, policy and procedures, sleeve sneeze, workplace hygiene, yearly flu vaccine
Posted in Employee Relations, Health and Safety, Human Resources, Human Rights | Make a Comment »

Absenteeism is on the rise

Thursday, September 8th, 2011

We have just reported our Q2 2011 results. We have gone through the time consuming and detailed process of auditing and are now in the process of letting folks know what happened in Q2 2011 on a range of metrics. One measure that we have been keeping a close eye on is absenteeism. Absenteeism keeps going up and the Q2 results are continuing that trend.

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Tags: Absenteeism, absenteeism rate, aging workforce, Analytics, Attendance management programs, Attendance policy, costs of absenteeism, Disability management programs, duty to accommodate, employment opportunities, HR metrics, labour market opportunity, people costs, productivity, Time and attendance, unemployment, voluntary turnover
Posted in Employee Relations, Health and Safety, HR Analytics, HRMS, Human Resources | Make a Comment »

I’m getting the sniffles… it’s another case of the World Cup Flu!

Friday, June 24th, 2011

‘Tis the season of the FIFA Women’s World Cup. This time, it’s women who are going to be playing, beginning this Sunday June 26 and ending July 17, in Germany. It may not be as popular as the men’s World Cup, but it is a busy and important year for women’s football/soccer! Will the rate of employee absenteeism be as high as when the men’s World Cup took place? Maybe not; but still, what can employers do to manage a sudden outbreak of “World Cup flu” cases in their workplace?

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Tags: Absences, Absenteeism, attendance, discipline, employee absenteeism, employment law, fifa, FIFA Women's World Cup Germany 2011, football, lateness, policies, sick leave, soccer, time in lieu of overtime, time theft, vacation time, women's soccer, work computers, world cup, World Cup Flu
Posted in Employee Relations, Employment Standards, Human Resources | Make a Comment »

New guide to CSR for small and medium businesses

Thursday, January 13th, 2011

A business research centre at Cardiff University, Wales, has teamed up with the British arm of the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants to release a new guide on corporate social responsibility (CSR) for small and medium-sized businesses, called The ABC of CSR for small and medium enterprises. If you don’t mind the Welsh, and can handle reading “programme” instead of “program”, then you might find this guide offers some valuable lessons.

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Tags: Absenteeism, corporate social responsibility, CSR, efficiency, employee retention, motivation, reputation, strategy, sustainability
Posted in Human Resources, Internal Controls, Recruiting and Hiring | Make a Comment »

A recent survey on job attitudes

Friday, October 29th, 2010

I just read an interesting article that found only 44% were satisfied with their jobs, about 32% were somewhat satisfied and 24% were not very satisfied or not at all satisfied. That is a significant number of people (56%) who did not answer “very satisfied” about their jobs.

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Tags: Absenteeism, competitiveness, economic recovery, employee health, employee turnover, Forum Research Inc., improving job satisfaction, Job performance, job satisfaction, Manufacturing, organizational behaviour, productivity, rewards, supervisor feedback, supportive conditions, the economy, working conditions, workplace survey, workplace trends
Posted in Human Resources, Training and Development | Make a Comment »

Organizational behaviour Part I: what is it and why is it important for employers?

Friday, July 16th, 2010

Organizational behaviour has been defined as the field of study that investigates the impact that individuals, groups and structures have on behaviour within organizations, particularly workplaces, in order to improve the organization’s effectiveness. But is it important for employers to understand organizational behaviour?

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Tags: ability, Absenteeism, employee retention, Human Resources, job satisfaction, learning, management skills, organizational behaviour, personality, planning, productivity, retention, strategy, turnover, workplace behaviour, workplace psychology
Posted in Human Resources | Make a Comment »

Disability management: Ignoring employee absences may prove costly for organizations

Wednesday, July 7th, 2010

A while back, the Conference Board of Canada came out with a study that found while workplace absenteeism continues to rise, Canadian employers take a “relaxed” approach to tracking employee absences and measuring their cost. According to the study, the absenteeism rate has been increasing steadily in the past decade, rising to 6.6 days per full-time employee in 2008–09 from 5.7 days in 2000–01, the most recent fiscal year. This is the highest point since the board began surveying employee absences 20 years ago.

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Tags: Absenteeism, absenteeism policies, absenteeism rate, attendance/absenteeism problem, average cost of absenteeism, Conference Board of Canada, cost associated with employee absenteeism, employee absences, employee attendance, employment law, HRMS, managing absenteeism, sick pay benefits, time off from work, tracking employee absences
Posted in Benefits, HRMS, Human Resources, Payroll | Make a Comment »

Has your workplace experienced an outbreak of the ‘World Cup Flu’?

Friday, June 18th, 2010

Are your employees suffering from the “World Cup Flu”? Are you finding that there is an unusually high rate of absenteeism in your office these days?

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Tags: Absenteeism, discipline, employment law, employment standards, fifa, flex time, hours of work, Human Resources, soccer, sports in the workplace, time in lieu of overtime, vacation time, working conditions, world cup
Posted in Employment Standards, Human Resources | Make a Comment »

Dealing with a disability leave

Friday, May 14th, 2010

What can an employer do when an employee has been off work for a significant period of time due to a disability (illness or injury)? How long must the employee remain employed with the employer under human rights law? These are questions often asked by employers and human resources professionals.

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Tags: Absenteeism, accommodating a disability, accommodation, chronic absence, Disability, disability leave, disability management, duty to accommodate, frustration of contract, Honda v. Keays, human rights, point of undue hardship, terminating a disabled employee, termination, undue hardhsip
Posted in Human Resources, Human Rights | Make a Comment »

Swine flu and the workplace

Monday, September 7th, 2009

With a new wave of swine flu (H1N1) predicted to hit by mid-October 2009, the Public Health Agency of Canada in collaboration with provincial and territorial governments have launched a new website FightFlu.ca at www.fightflu.ca. It is a one-stop access to online information and resources about H1N1 flu virus. In addition, the agency has awarded a contract worth $926,600 under the Pandemic Preparedness Response Fund to the International Centre for Infectious Diseases (ICID) to develop tools and strategies that small and medium sized businesses can use to take action to ensure they recognize and deal with the challenges brought on by the virus, and develop plans to deal with increased employee absenteeism and disruptions in their operations.

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Tags: Absenteeism, Business continuity, emergency preparedness, H1N1, health and safety, HR issues, human rights, illness at work, Leaves of absence, occupational health and safety, pandemic, pandemic planning, pandemic policies, policy, sick leave, swine flu, swine flu at work, workers compensation, workplace preparedness
Posted in Health and Safety, Human Resources | 8 Comments »

Posts Tagged ‘Absenteeism’

Sick days or personal days?

Tips to prevent the spread of colds and flu in the workplace

Absenteeism is on the rise

I’m getting the sniffles… it’s another case of the World Cup Flu!

New guide to CSR for small and medium businesses

A recent survey on job attitudes

Organizational behaviour Part I: what is it and why is it important for employers?

Disability management: Ignoring employee absences may prove costly for organizations

Has your workplace experienced an outbreak of the ‘World Cup Flu’?

Dealing with a disability leave

Swine flu and the workplace

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