Presenteeism

Presenteeism: a definition

Presenteeism (الحضور غير المنتج) is an employee being at work while unable to do that work as it should be done, whether because of illness, exhaustion or a mind taken up with something else. The employee is counted as present for the day, yet does not produce the output that their presence is supposed to stand for.

Why presenteeism does not show up in any record

Attendance records capture whether an employee is there. They do not capture whether the employee is able to work. An employee who arrives on time, stays until the end of the day and leaves on schedule produces the same entry in the record whether that day was productive or not. Presenteeism, by its nature, therefore leaves no trace in attendance records: the record shows a full day, and the shortfall sits in the work itself, where the record does not reach.

For that reason presenteeism has to be inferred from evidence other than the attendance record. The evidence lies in the work, and four signs can point to it:

• A rise in errors with no change in the volume of work. More mistakes are being made while the amount of work has stayed where it was. The condition attached to this sign matters, because a rise in errors that comes with a rise in volume has a different explanation, which is the volume itself.
• Repeated rework. Work that has been handed over comes back to be done again, and it does so more than once. The work is being delivered, but not in a state in which it can stand.
• Delays in simple tasks that used to be finished on time. The sign lies in the comparison with the employee’s own earlier record. The tasks in question are not hard ones, and the same employee used to complete them within their deadlines.
• Lower participation in meetings from people who used to take part. Again the comparison is with the person’s own habit. Someone who has regularly contributed in meetings becomes quieter in them, while still attending.

What produces presenteeism in the workplace

Presenteeism can be produced by conditions in the working environment, not only by the state of the individual employee. Four of those conditions are set out below.

• A culture that rewards being present. When it is noticed that one employee leaves at the stated time, and another employee is thanked for staying on, being present can become a value in its own right. Nobody needs to say so for the message to be sent: noticing the one and thanking the other can be enough. Presence then earns recognition whether or not anything is produced during it, and an employee who is unwell or exhausted has a reason to stay at their desk.
• Sick leave that carries a social cost. Sick leave can be granted under the rules that govern the employee. When the environment makes the person who takes it feel that they have fallen short, those rules and that environment together can produce an employee who is ill and sitting in the office. The entitlement exists on paper, and the cost of using it is paid in how the absence is regarded at work.
• No one to cover the work. An employee whose work nobody else covers can come in while ill, even when staying at home would be justified, because a day away turns into a backlog that will be waiting for them on their return.
• Outputs that are not clearly defined. When an employee is judged by attendance because their outputs are hard to measure, attendance may be what that employee offers. If presence is the only thing that is visible to the organisation, presence is what the employee has to show.

Why absenteeism figures alone do not reveal presenteeism

The absenteeism rate is visible and can be measured. Because it can be seen and counted, it can be addressed: a figure that rises gives the organisation something to respond to. Presenteeism cannot be seen, and so it can continue without being addressed. An organisation that looks only at absence is therefore looking at the part of the problem that is recorded, and the employee who is present and unable to work does not appear in that figure at all.

There is a further consequence where the cause of presenteeism is illness. In those cases an employee who comes to work with an infectious illness may pass it on to the rest of the team. The cost of presenteeism in that case is no longer confined to the employee who came in.

What reduces presenteeism

The practical way in is not a new policy. It is removing the cost of legitimate absence, so that staying away when there is good reason to does not count against the employee. That has three parts:

• Taking sick leave as an ordinary procedure. It should be handled as a routine step, not as a stance that is held against the person who takes it. A request for sick leave is then processed like any other request, and nothing about the employee’s standing is inferred from it.
• A known substitute for every critical role. Each role on which the work depends has someone named who can take on its duties when the holder is away, so that an absence does not turn into a backlog. The substitute is known in advance: named before the absence occurs, not looked for once it has begun.
• Measuring work by its outputs wherever possible. Where the work allows it, the employee is judged on what they produce, so that presence stops being the only thing the employee can show. The qualifier matters, because the fourth condition above arises precisely where outputs are hard to measure, and measurement by outputs reaches only as far as the work permits.

The behaviour of managers remains a signal to the team, and the team takes its cue from it whether or not anything is said. A manager who comes to work while ill can be understood by the team to mean that this is what is expected of everyone.

This is an explanation of the concept, not legal advice.