Mental health problems are common in the general population. While it is true that work can promote people’s mental health, it can also pose risks. Stress, for example, is a common phenomenon. In fact, it is one of the most serious health problems today, which not only affects workers to cause them physical or mental disability, but also employers and governments, who begin to assess the financial damage they cause. Symptoms of stress are one of the most common causes of absenteeism from work, somatic illness and productivity decrease. How to influence individual factors, organizational and ergonomic relationship work stress and mental workload has been studied for a long time. That can give us a clue of how important it is. This is the reason why it has increased the interest for researchers of occupational health.

        Moreover, the quick increase in the researches on job stress has been linked to the need to study it in relation to the development of Burnout Syndrome. This syndrome was firstly described in medical institutions, but today is applicable to other companies (startups, large multinationals …) with some differences. The best known definition of burnout syndrome is the one from Maslach and Jackson, who described it as a multiple state of emotional exhaustion, physical and mental health caused by chronic stress. The syndrome is characterized by three factors:

a) emotional exhaustion, which refers to a reduction in the emotional resources to act, accompanied by somatic and psychological,such as anxiety and irritability.

b) depersonalization, which refers to the development of cynical attitudes, impersonal and insensitive to colleagues and customers.

c) lack of personal accomplishment, refers to the perception that the chances of achievement at work have disappeared, along with experiences of failure and feelings of worthlessness.

       The things that stress us (what we call “life stressors”) do not affect everyone the same. It will depend a lot on vulnerability, the type of situation and coping tools that each person have. Coping mechanisms are personal factors involved in the occurrence of burnout syndrome, strategies used by individuals who try to manage work stress and mitigate the negative consequences that have been described.

           Companies and institutions have exposed the need to worry about the quality of working life they offer to their employees. Today, it is considered essential to include aspects of wellness and health to assess the effectiveness of a particular institution (such as work stress management), since the onset of burnout can cause serious problems for service providers and customers (a person who feels irritated and  unsuccessful will not offer the same treatment to a client than one employee who feels satisfied and cheerful).

            Although this workplace health programs are important, it’s true that a thing that affects to the low satisfaction ratings may also be an out-growth of the use of ineffective work-life balance programs. While employers offer an average of nine work-life balance programs to employees, these do not always include those with demonstrated effectiveness. For example, a compressed work week has been shown to be the most effective intervention for reducing unscheduled absences, but less than half of the employers surveyed by the Commercial Clearing House offered such a program. This highlights the importance of selecting work-life programs with demonstrated effectiveness in improving employee health and reducing stres, burnout and absenteeism.

Picture from http://www.workingworld.com/articles/10-ways-to-escape-job-burnout

What we absenteeism at the workplace is the absence or leaving the job in hours corresponding to a working day, within the legal working hours.This is ultimately one of the problems of most concern to enterprises because the organizational problems and high costs generated.

Absenteeism has a material effect on the bottom line of most companies, yet few managers really understand the magnitude of the problem at their company.  According to statistical data collected in the U.S. the unscheduled absenteeism rate as absenteeism, sickness, accident or temporary disability, hourly workforce is approximately 9% in 2010 (CIRCADIAN’s Shiftwork Practices 2010). That means that almost one in ten workers is absent when he or she should be at work. There are considerable direct and indirect costs in all absence types that cause disruption to the business, make it difficult to deploy the workforce, and have a deep effect on productivity, profit margins, and employee morale.

         For a manager to comprehend the potential costs of absenteeism to the company, we can calculate the direct costs to the employer. To make it easy, according to the data, in a total of 2.917.200 public employees followed in Spain, 63.100 did not attend each week to work for temporary disability. For the private sector, if the number of employees amounts to 11.693.100, around 248.900 stayed home sick leave. In the average hourly workplace, typical unscheduled absenteeism rates in the U.S. range from 5% to 10% (i.e. at any given time 5% to 10% of the workforce is missing from work).

        These figures are shocking today, but it is also true that with the economic crisis absenteeism has decreased. It seems that seeing endanger the workplace makes us less sick or is the best medicine to heal many of the “overpretexting” who were a few years ago.

        We can find different types of absenteeism in the workplace, we can summarize them in three:

- Absenteeism predictable and justified: the one that can be controlled because the worker reported prior to the company (legal permits paid, sick leave with common diseases, accidents

with sick leave, etc.).

- Absenteeism unpredictable and without justification is when you leave the workplace without authorization from the company.

- Absenteeism in person: when the employee comes to his/her job, but most of time is devoted to tasks that are not specific to the work activity. This is the most dangerous of all, because it’s so difficult to detect and intercept. Many companies require their workers a physical presence in his job for 8 hours a day but do not control if those eight hours are real and productive, meaning that the worker may be physically sitting in his job as his mind or spirit is thousands of miles, for example, surfing the Internet or just solving other personal issues that are of most interest to the worker.

      Dealing absenteeism in the workplace involves analyzing many factors: employee motivation, interpersonal relationships, the company’s strategic plan, goals, etc. And to do all this is not easy. If we consider that work motivation is the key, and this is due to intrinsic and/or extrinsic, then we must ask what is it that really motivates our employees, instead of giving orders task haphazardly. In addition, there is evidence that employees with good or very good morale miss less work than employees with fair or poor morale and that high morale translates into higher levels of productivity, reduced absenteeism and a greater commitment to the organization.

        One of the keys to motivation among employees is to make the company feel like yours and live as such, both successes and failures. Every employee should feel an important and necessary part of the machinery gear without which the company operates. Only then each takes the work to be performed. All are important and absolutely necessary, should have a sense of team and be stronger. And following the simile, like all machinery must be lubricated occasionally pieces to promote the operation, that is needed to encourage or motivate workers to get reach the target.

       Incentives do not have to be money, it does not take a psychologist to know that money is one of the worst motivators because the resulting positive impact remains very little over time. In many cases the simple recognition of our work, the power to reach goals and objectives or get love relationships with those around us it’s enough to encourage us to continue the right progress.If employees do not find their job challenging, dissatisfaction creeps in.

      Workplace culture also has an influence on employees’ understanding of what is and is not acceptable behavior. Clear attendance expectations and positive reinforcement are essential elements in reducing absenteeism.

Partially adapted from http://agalamartin1.blogspot.com.es and Workforce Institute http://www.workforceinstitute.org/. Picture from http://www.referenceforbusiness.com/photos/absenteeism-629.jpg.

]]> http://www.innervirtuoso.com/absenteeism-causes-high-losses-to-the-companies/feed/ 0 http://www.innervirtuoso.com/gallery-post/ http://www.innervirtuoso.com/gallery-post/#comments Wed, 12 Jun 2013 12:36:11 +0000 http://themes.webmandesign.eu/clifden-demo/?p=302 Welcome to Inner Virtuoso!

Maybe you were surfing the internet, and suddenly you hit us. Perhaps as you read these lines you’re saying to yourself » Really?! Another blog about personal development?» However, the reality is far from that description. We are not «another blog». We are not «another app». Or at least, we do not want to be. We want to become your faithful companion, we want to be what helps you to grow, what helps you to be yourself. An ambitious project, right? Well, all the success will depend on you, and your desire to improve!

         In these days of rush, stress and frustrations, we want to open a space where you can enjoy yourself, where you have time to grow and get new tools that allow you to build the best version of yourself. With that in mind, we created Inner Virtuoso, a multi-App platform that will help you to change what you want at any time.

The objective of Inner Virtuoso’s blog is twofold: first, the idea is to share with you news about personal development in the six areas of life that we propose (Carrera and wealth, physical health, Mental health, social area and community, Entertainment and Knowledge and Wisdom). In addition, we provide support to the users of our platform, from which you will manage growth, and help you improve through different apps. From here we invite you to participate, to write, to share experiences and, above all, to grow to be yourself!

Nam liber tempor cum soluta nobis eleifend option congue nihil imperdiet doming id quod mazim placerat facer possim assum. Typi non habent claritatem insitam; est usus legentis in iis qui facit eorum claritatem. Investigationes demonstraverunt lectores legere me lius quod ii legunt saepius. Claritas est etiam processus dynamicus, qui sequitur mutationem consuetudium lectorum. Mirum est notare quam littera gothica, quam nunc putamus parum claram, anteposuerit litterarum formas humanitatis per seacula quarta decima et quinta decima. Eodem modo typi, qui nunc nobis videntur parum clari, fiant sollemnes in futurum.

Nam liber tempor cum soluta nobis eleifend option congue nihil imperdiet doming id quod mazim placerat facer possim assum. Typi non habent claritatem insitam; est usus legentis in iis qui facit eorum claritatem. Investigationes demonstraverunt lectores legere me lius quod ii legunt saepius. Claritas est etiam processus dynamicus, qui sequitur mutationem consuetudium lectorum. Mirum est notare quam littera gothica, quam nunc putamus parum claram, anteposuerit litterarum formas humanitatis per seacula quarta decima et quinta decima. Eodem modo typi, qui nunc nobis videntur parum clari, fiant sollemnes in futurum.

Nam liber tempor cum soluta nobis eleifend option congue nihil imperdiet doming id quod mazim placerat facer possim assum. Typi non habent claritatem insitam; est usus legentis in iis qui facit eorum claritatem. Investigationes demonstraverunt lectores legere me lius quod ii legunt saepius. Claritas est etiam processus dynamicus, qui sequitur mutationem consuetudium lectorum. Mirum est notare quam littera gothica, quam nunc putamus parum claram, anteposuerit litterarum formas humanitatis per seacula quarta decima et quinta decima. Eodem modo typi, qui nunc nobis videntur parum clari, fiant sollemnes in futurum.

Nam liber tempor cum soluta nobis eleifend option congue nihil imperdiet doming id quod mazim placerat facer possim assum. Typi non habent claritatem insitam; est usus legentis in iis qui facit eorum claritatem. Investigationes demonstraverunt lectores legere me lius quod ii legunt saepius. Claritas est etiam processus dynamicus, qui sequitur mutationem consuetudium lectorum. Mirum est notare quam littera gothica, quam nunc putamus parum claram, anteposuerit litterarum formas humanitatis per seacula quarta decima et quinta decima. Eodem modo typi, qui nunc nobis videntur parum clari, fiant sollemnes in futurum.

Nam liber tempor cum soluta nobis eleifend option congue nihil imperdiet doming id quod mazim placerat facer possim assum. Typi non habent claritatem insitam; est usus legentis in iis qui facit eorum claritatem. Investigationes demonstraverunt lectores legere me lius quod ii legunt saepius. Claritas est etiam processus dynamicus, qui sequitur mutationem consuetudium lectorum. Mirum est notare quam littera gothica, quam nunc putamus parum claram, anteposuerit litterarum formas humanitatis per seacula quarta decima et quinta decima. Eodem modo typi, qui nunc nobis videntur parum clari, fiant sollemnes in futurum.

Nam liber tempor cum soluta nobis eleifend option congue nihil imperdiet doming id quod mazim placerat facer possim assum. Typi non habent claritatem insitam; est usus legentis in iis qui facit eorum claritatem. Investigationes demonstraverunt lectores legere me lius quod ii legunt saepius. Claritas est etiam processus dynamicus, qui sequitur mutationem consuetudium lectorum. Mirum est notare quam littera gothica, quam nunc putamus parum claram, anteposuerit litterarum formas humanitatis per seacula quarta decima et quinta decima. Eodem modo typi, qui nunc nobis videntur parum clari, fiant sollemnes in futurum.