Managing Retention and Absenteeism

1. Abstract
Managing retention and absenteeism is an important task for every company or employer. It can be assessed as a process with few stages. This paper will look at identifying the cost of employee turnover, importance of understanding why employee leaves, retention strategies and how they should be implemented.
The first step of an effective attendance management program is to identify specific areas which are affecting attendance. Some general causes of absenteeism will be mentioned later in this paper.

2. Background
The importance of this briefing paper is to summarize all gained information, knowledge and facts regarding to issues in Managing retention and absenteeism in business, preparation to write an individual academic paper and to give a brief idea how it will be approached.
In Managing retention and absenteeism is necessary to cover following areas: * Absenteeism * Sickness absence * Employee turnover * Staff retention strategies * Staff retention and management of knowledge * Benefits of staff retention

3. Findings

4.1 What the assignment is asking me to do
The definition of absenteeism according to Mathis and Jackson (2005) is any failure to report for work as scheduled or to stay at work when scheduled. They divide absenteeism into 2 groups: voluntary, that is unavoidable and voluntary, avoidable.
The sickness absence can be short - term (repetitive) or long term illness. CIPD’s Absence Management Survey (2011) revealed for the first time that stress is the most common cause of long – term sickness absence. The top causes of stress are organisational change and restructuring, job cuts, pension benefits and job insecurity.
To manage absenteeism it is important to record and monitor absence rates. Managers should treat each case individually and set an example of good attendance. Motivation and gaining commitment from staff, possibly offering incentives for attendance are also the ways to tackle the absenteeism.
It is important for a company to decide how it is going to record the absenteeism and staff turnover. It costs companies billions of pounds each year, approximately £666 per employee and it is often a result of a poor management performance.
Mathis and Jackson (2010) on cost of absenteeism: Absenteeism is expensive and it can be controlled by discipline, positive reinforcement, use of no-fault policy and paid time – off programs.
Measurement of sickness absence according to Pilbrim and Corbridge (2006):

Potential working days lost = Number of days absence x 100 Potential working days available

Frequency rate = Number of instances of sick absence x 100 Average number of employees

Absence can be expensive for the following reasons:
• lost or delayed production
• additional staff or overtime
• inability to provide services
• the sick pay

Except for financial cost to organisations, absence has a psychological cost too. It increases pressure on those who must cover absent colleague and manager who has to manage with fewer or less skilled people. It causes frustration when unexpected absence needs rescheduling and may increase accident rates due to stress of extra work.

4.2 What I know about the subject already

Managers need to understand how to develop and retain talent, staff retention strategies, labour turnover and turnover costs. High performance working involves recruitment and selection procedures, training and development and harmony in working team. It all is linked to job satisfaction. Every employee would like to work in balanced environment, where his skills are widely used, with good communication with the management and opportunity for further training and development. Not forgetting a reward and relevant support.
Mathis and Jackson (2005) define job satisfaction as a positive emotional state resulting from evaluating one’s job experience. Another factor that makes employee stay at work is according to them the organisation commitment, which they define as the degree to which employees believe in and accept organisational goals and desire to remain with organization. Manager should observe their employees and try them to resolve the problem by discussing the issue. It might work well, in worse case it will lead to employee leaving the organization.
Bloisi (2007) splits reasons for people staying at work in two categories. Psychological contrast – unwritten expectations employees and employers have about nature of their work relationship. It is affected by the age of employee and changes in economic conditions. Second reason is Psychological ownership, when individuals feel that they have some control and rights in organization and they are more likely to be committed.
People leave work for many reasons, most of them are often preventable. As well as job dissatisfaction it can also be a pay and reward, some personal attributes, quality of supervision or co-workers. Another quite common reason is bullying. Mike Emmott, CIPD Employee Relations Adviser, says: “Bullying and harassment is a serious problem in many workplaces and employers need to take the issue more seriously. It can damage individuals’ confidence, morale, motivation and sometimes their health causing them to be less productive and effective at work. It can also trigger absenteeism, make retention rates go down and both the employer’s reputation and bottom line can take a hit.’’

4.3 What I think my focus might be?

Employee retention is beneficial for the organization as well as the employee. Employees today are different. They have good opportunities and choices on hand. As soon as they feel dissatisfied with the current job, they switch over to the next one. It is the responsibility of the employer to retain their best employees and a good employer should know how to attract and retain them, especially in this difficult economic situation.
The process of staff retention starts at the beginning of employment and it is linked with selecting the right and suitable person to avoid the job dissatisfaction and to match their expectations. Following are benefits of staff retention by Browell (2003): * Reduces cost of recruitment, selection and training of new staff * Easier to recruit new staff * Keeps skills and knowledge in the organisation * Improves performance, productivity and profitability * Improves customer loyalty and satisfaction * Can increase sales and aid competitiveness * Less costly than replacing staff

4.4 What arguments I think I might want to make and where am I going to find the evidence to support these arguments?

More research needs to be done for this paragraph. It will cover issues of reducing staff sickness absence, strategies and their effectiveness. Should employee with clean sickness absence be rewarded and will it demotivate staff who had been off sick for genuine reasons? Pointing out the importance of direct communication between staff and employer is necessary. It can not only solve the problems, but will show a positive approach.
Resources to support this argument can be found on the CIPD’s website, including research reports and online tools. Their forum section includes CIPD members’ discussions on the topic issues with other HR practitioners. Bloisi (2007) p.203 discusses Tesco’s approaches to sick absence and their strategies to tackle the issue. They launched reward scheme for staff who have a good attendance, such as extra holiday or reward vouchers, and those with bad records for turning up will not get their sick pay for first three days off.
It is believed, that every one in three days off has nothing to do with sickness. Human resource profesionals agree. There will be more discussion on the topic in the individual paper including impacts of the different schemes on the employees.
Another argument needs to be raised is job sharing. Is this one of the ways to reduce staff absence? As mentioned earlier staff absence is a particular problem and a cost business lot of money every year. McDonald decided to tackle this issue by introducing ‘family contracts’. It allows their staff to share and swap their job position with other family member without notifying management in advance, Bloisi (2007) p.68. The problems that could arise by employing family on one contract are well discussed by Alder (2006) in ‘Beware the risks of job share schemes ‘p.15.

4.5 The structure of the final individual paper

INTRODUCTION - to identify the main issues, explain and assess the quality of the evidence available
MAIN BODY - where the evidence is presented, examined, arguments put forward and supported
CONCLUSION - summary
1. Introduction (5%) * Comments on the topic of the essay * Explanation of aspects of the topic to be covered and why

2. Body (80%)
Developing the argument. Each of the main points is to be supported with examples. Findings will be split into paragraphs; one paragraph for each aspect of the topic.
A paragraphs will either raise or develop a particular issue.

3. Conclusion (15%)
Summarizing main ideas and drawing a general conclusion from the argument. No new arguments or information.

4.6 Draft the introduction of your final paper

Managing retention and absenteeism is an important task for every company or employer. It can be assessed as a process with few stages. This paper will look at identifying the cost of employee turnover, importance of understanding why employee leaves, retention strategies and how they should be implemented.
The first step of an effective attendance management program is to identify specific areas which are affecting attendance. Some general causes of absenteeism will be mentioned later in this paper.

4. Evaluation
This briefing paper covers all the main issues of the selected topic. It is structured and contains elements given in the module booklet. All the questions have been answered and supported, however more research is needed to write an individual paper. All the sources used in this work are included in Reference list, using Harvard system of referencing. Spelling and grammar is the best of the knowledge.