Sunday, July 5. 2009Only A Satisfying Career Or Alcohol Abuse.....John Linton ........appears to prevent 'food poisoning' and 'gastric attacks' .....and 'flu'. One of those rare Sydney winter mornnigs when it's dazzlingly bright with completely cloudless light blue skies but so cold you don't want to get out of bed - so I didn't for a while. Perhaps its increasing old age and ever degenerating unfitness but sometimes it seems the nicest thing to do. There must be some point in everyone's life when the disciplines of long practice must finally give way to the body and mind's desires not to start working as they have been trained by decades of custom to do - I think I'm getting to that time of life......which under Labor's new workplace reforms (which I skimmed over a cup of coffee earlier) may make it easier for me to blackmail my boss into providing an incredible array of accommodations to me. Then again - long experience has taught me that my boss is the last person in the world to try and blackmail on anything. Periodically my mind turns to that constant reminder of the problem of having a 'job' rather than a 'career' - the "I'm so sick I won't be in today" emails (few people risk a phone call on these lies these days). Exetel has been luckier than most companies with the people we hire in that the majority of our people seldom if ever get "sick" and in the areas in which they buy their takeaway the establishments they buy from are run hygenically enough to prevent the constant "food poisoning" that afflicts some people so regularly requiring them to spend so many Mondays and Fridays "close to a bathroom". It's one of the most annoying situations in Australian business life and one inculcated in to so many people's habits presumably because of the indoctrination they receive from their 'cultural', educational and home backgrounds. Whenever I read one of those "I've got food poisoning" emails I feel mildly embarrassed for the person who thinks they can get away with lying so transparently and so unimaginatively but I also understand that sadness of having a job that does not fully occupy your working day and that you think so little of it, your work colleagues who will have to do your work as well as their own and your employer, that you can just not turn up to do it. The 'defence' of this is that "everybody gets sick occasionally" to which my reply is invariably - that simply isn't true. I doubt that anyone can remember their mother ever being sick (by that I mean staying in bed feeling sorry for themselves instead of getting their children's breakfast and seeing them off to school) and in the 30+ years I've known Annette I can remember one half day of crippling flu she had trouble with. So mothers are apparently immune to 'one day food poisoning' etc. I think I may have had half a day away from 'work' because of the same thing that crippled Annette over all the time I can remember but I put that down to too much alcohol in my bloodstream and digestive system that simply overwhelms any bug foolish enough to turn up there. Then there's......but it is pointless to go on......the reality is that people on whom other people depend just don't get sick for one day on eight occasions a year and people who have jobs that they aren't that enthused about don't get sick either - they just take advantage of left wing union induced additional "award" holidays. This pernicious and unacceptable 'practice' isn't going to go away in Australia and as far as I have seen all commercial companies simply budget for the 'don't care' attitudes of whatever percentage of employees they believe will indulge themselves in this deceit by over hiring or living with the problem and the inconveniences it causes. Obviously production line type employment and many others (including call centres) have to over hire or they would grind to a halt in Australia. I have always thought that it is inherently unfair that dedicated employees who don't malinger are disadvantaged by deceitful employees who do. It offends my ingrained sense of right and wrong or whatever. Apart from that it increases the costs of the services and therefore endangers the viability of the company. However the most serious issue is that it really annoys the people who aren't so dishonest and do make light of any slight inconvenience that may afflict them from time to time. This situation was uppermost in my mind this morning because I was reviewing the last minute changes we were making to the Sri Lankan company's business plan where 'not turning up for work' is, I am assured, a part of Sri Lanka culture. Having been appraised of this I agreed to hiring additional personnel to prevent the call centre queue times being negatively affected as they had been on some occasions recently. It was surprising what that change resulted in over a full financial year in terms of the bottom line cost of running that operation. As we pay 2 - 3 times more for each job type in Colombo than other similar employers it also surprised me that the people there would behave so casually towards their 'good fortune' in finding a job that pays so much better than they would normally be able to find - but, as in Australia, I understand what "culture" can produce in terms of changing views about your employer's money and your own money - and I doubt that such attitudes are confined to Australia and Sri Lanka. Until I looked at the changes necessitated by 'allowing for' this 'cultural' characteristic actually made it had never been quite as clear to me what a financial negative such 'cultural characteristics' result in. In the past I have discussed this subject with various business acquaintances whom all, pretty much, have taken the view that 'absenteeism' is a given for non-professional personnel and there's nothing that can be done. The consensus was that non-professional employee absenteeism should be treated like payroll tax - add 6% or so to your monthly salary bill to take account of it rather than worrying about the rights and wrongs of State encouraged theft. Sensible enough approach and apart from improving personnel hiring processes there's nothing much more that can be done in the opinion of everybody I have ever talked to on the subject. Fortunately Exetel in Australia has little problem of this 'cultural' sort - we do have some but it is confined to half a dozen totally predictable people and is dealt with quite simply (we deduct 1% per 'sickie day' - as opposed to 'sick' day - taken from their next salary increase). Exetel in Sri Lanka is too new for our 'standard' way of dealing with this problem to work in the short term but, hopefully, it will work over a relatively short time. Rapid career development seems to provide immunity to almost every 'one day ailment' known in Australia; almost zero cases of longweekendwithmymatesviridae, godigotpissedlastnightviridae and the ever popular shitit'stoolatetogotoworknowotropic virus. Trackbacks
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A sensible approach is to recognise that stress and tiredness are real issues in any workforce, and sometimes people need a day off even if they don't have a viral or bacterial illness. Progressive companies allow staff to take single days of "personal leave" from their sick leave allowances (with the same rules about multiple consecutive days requiring medical certificates) so that staff don't feel like they have to lie about it.
Comments (2)
...of course...but the situations you cite aren't the dishonest/deceitful situations I cited.
...as for getting tired....well, girls, 5 days a week less ten public hoidays and 20 annual leave days is hardly burdensome..... Comments (3)
Dan,
Isn't that what annual leave is for? Time off to forget about work ? You could apply incentives for employees to not use sick days, but then those that do would claim they are disadvantaged. Comment (1)
There are some cases where one person taking a "sickie" is beneficial to the workplace as a whole.
I have experience of "heroes" coming in to work with flu and spreading it around the office. Your 1 sick day = 1% less pay increase seems a little harsh! Comment (1)
....it isn't very difficult to tell the difference between "sickies" and real illness.
Comments (3)
Annual leave is meant to be pre-arranged in advance, and a company can also deny it. Sometimes, people just need a day off for whatever reason, and they don't have advance warning of it. As long as sick leave exists, people will take those days when they need them -- but it's a silly charade having to put on a croaky voice and say you'll be really grateful for the time in bed. (Another thing: if more companies had sensible work-from-home policies, with output-based performance tracking rather than 9-to-5 based, there would be far less sickies taken.)
Comments (2)
In 22 years in my current job I've had 1.5 days sick leave. The half a day was before I had reached a required 42 days employment, so I wasn't entitlted to sick pay for that half a day!
Perhaps I'm blessed with good health (so far!). I've never thought of taking a "sickie" because of over-indulgence the night before, and I've been there a few times. I've always thought a pro-rata system such as a few extra annual leave days for those taking minimal sick leave was a good idea and incentive not to take "sickies", but there is then the problem of those turning up to work spreading disease as well as those who unfortunately are not blessed with very good health. Whatever, there should be some sort of "reward" for those who use little of their 10 days or so of sick leave a year. Comment (1)
The problem with sick leave is that its a case of use it or lose it. I have worked with people who have quit with hundreds of days of built of sick leave and not have it paid out.
Most of us made sure to use most of our sick leave each year and leave a few days just in case we need it. When it came time to quit the job we would suddenly all get sick, I myself used my remaining sick leave to get dental surgery done before I quit. The MD did tell us all off one month for taking too much leave. But that month the cold/flu did the rounds and it was school holidays so parents took time off. Comment (1)
I worked for many many years with a big multinational company in a semi professional capacity. One of the perks was "unlimited" sick leave. It could not be saved as it was just there if needed.
I took maybe five days off in my time there. Other people took huge amounts of time off. One guy would take a week or more off every time he got a cold and he got sick often. He was never counselled and it did not affect his career. I have to say it did affect morale as you felt silly for coming in to work EVERY day. Long story short, last year a combination of the GFC and outsourcing resulted in many of us getting the boot. Attendance was not a consideration. Maybe I should have taken more days off? In the end it did not matter. Comment (1)
If a company has such a policy then presumably there wasn't enough work to keep each person occupied.
It's sad about the end effect on you and others. Comments (3)
Good to see there are others out there who hate the idea of sick days as much as me.
Having all employees as 'casual' 40 hours a week fixes that. Increase my rate a bit and for go any sickness entitlements. No workplace relations system required. I rarely got sick The only time it did happen I was off for a week, and that's just the hit I take. But really, everyone obviously isn't taught at school to have enough money so you can survive for a month or two without any income. They teach no life skills in school. Weird. It suprises me how few people have income protection insurance too. A car worth thousands of dollars, I insure that. I am worth millions of dollars therefore I insure me too. Comment (1)
Having spent 20yrs in Local Govt, I found that most workers would pre-book an RTO/RDO rather than use a sick day. There's always exceptions, but to have an RTO/RDO system which is flexible (ie not always the 3rd Tuesday of the month - take it when you need it!) is something I would introduce if my business ever grows to having multiple staff.
Sometimes these days are used when a child has a school sports carnival, or there's a particular sporting event you want to watch on tv. Yes you're short one person when the RDO is taken, but at least you don't have 2-3 missing and you know about it in advance. It certainly reduces Mondayitis. Comment (1)
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