On how to improve absence management, nearly 60% of 18-30-year-olds in the United States use more than five sick days per year, with direct financial losses from absenteeism estimated to be more than $40 billion per year. With such staggering figures, it’s no surprise that better absence management is a primary goal for employers.

But what are the most effective methods for enhancing your absence management?

First and foremost, let’s be clear. Even if we all prefer to think of our employees as superheroes (and occasionally they are), let’s not forget that we’re all human. Employees will have to take sick days until we reach Wolverine-like powers of self-healing.

When organizations fail to effectively control and cite their absenteeism rates, they typically face two primary issues:

They are unable to manage the dangers.

They are unconcerned with employee welfare.

Here are five suggestions for avoiding this and improving your absence management.

1. Software is your friend

Isn’t it true that you have to adore software? It greatly simplifies your life. Absence management software is most effective when it’s linked to other systems, such as your workforce management system.

Absence management software helps employers keep employee absence costs low and productivity high. Without a quick response, you risk seeing an increase in staff absenteeism, which can have a severe impact on your bottom line and expose your company to absenteeism non-compliance concerns. 

The software will track, quantify, and even forecast absence. The margin for mistake is virtually eliminated when using a system that integrates scheduling, time reporting, and payroll. It also helps you to identify replacements fast and manage leave applications with a single click.

Errors are no longer an issue.

The ability to eliminate errors is one of the most effective advantages of utilizing the appropriate software. When absence management is managed through your workforce management software, for example, you can:

• Communicate with managers and employees about absence requests in real time.
• Check absence balances both automatically and manually to ensure the employee is not taking too much time off. All forms of absence balances are openly displayed at all times.
• Calculate the accrual of earned time off by accurately forecasting future balances for all regulations and anticipated leave utilization.
• Automatic checks against working time instructions and employee contracts reduce the possibility of noncompliance.
• All accrual policies, including carryovers and prorations, should be automated.
• Ascertain that absences are compensated at the appropriate rates and that leave usage is scheduled, as well as calculate the accrual of earned time off.

2. Investigate the data

Using software to better manage your absences will provide you with unprecedented insight into your employees’ behavior. You’ll be able to make better judgments about your absence management because to the amount of data you’ll have at your fingertips. You’ll be able to better plan for absences by observing patterns and trends in your past data.

Furthermore, your software’s artificial intelligence and machine learning alert your supervisors when someone is likely to be missing on any given day. It also makes intelligent recommendations for who can fill in for people who are absent, both before and after the requests are authorized.

3. Use ‘presenteeism’ to your advantage.

The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CPID), based in the United Kingdom, stated in a recent absence management report:

‘Developing managers’ people management skills, promoting an open culture where people feel free to raise issues, and enabling employees to understand how their job role contributes to the organization’s performance are the most common methods that private sector organizations are focusing on to encourage employees to want to come to work are the most common methods that private sector organizations are focusing on to encourage employees to want to come to work are the most common methods that private sector organizations are focusing on to encourage employees to want to come to work are the most common methods that private

When companies focus on employee engagement and fostering a happy staff, attendance improves.

4. Provide options

Employees feel more ownership and control when they have the option of working flexible hours that fit their lifestyle while still meeting the needs of the company.

Encouraging a life outside of work and putting in place measures to support it yields positive results and produces employees who feel valued. Simple improvements, such as allowing employees to choose the shifts they work, can have a significant impact in order to improve absence management.

Flexible working can help your organization save time, reduce costs, improve employee retention, and boost employee happiness, according to 85 percent of workers who believe flexibility makes them more productive. With the right tools and technology in place, flexible working can help your organization not only improve productivity, but also save time, reduce costs, improve employee retention, and boost employee happiness.

5. Have a clear goal in mind

Meaning is beginning to matter more than money to your employees. Employees who believe they have a purpose and meaning at work and can see how their contributions make a difference are significantly more likely to stay with their companies and take fewer sick days.

Furthermore, as our culture evolves from materialism to experimentalism, your staff will be affected:

• Don’t be bothered about how much money they make.
• Be less likely to work long hours in order to gain more money so they can buy things they don’t need to impress others.
• Pay more attention to the quality of their job.
• Would you like to work for a company that shares your values?
• They want their job to have a strong sense of purpose and significance.

FINAL NOTE: In achieving how to improve absence management, regular chats and always follow up on discussions to ensure that they are documented. This will assist the employer in demonstrating that they are acting reasonably by proactively managing the employee’s absence/return to work, as well as highlighting any issues that may require further investigation at an early stage. It should also keep the employee interested in his or her own absence and return.