What is absenteeism in the workplace?

Employee absenteeism is when an employee demonstrates a pattern of missing work. This can include them being regularly late or frequently calling in sick at the last minute without a good reason. 

Absenteeism vs missing work due to specific reasons

Absences at work occur from time to time due to personal or medical reasons. This is not technically considered absenteeism, as valid reasons for missing work are generally not a cause for concern.

Additionally, you might have an arrangement where an employee takes leave or works remotely during certain days of the week. Similarly, you might offer flexible working arrangements to fit in around caring or other similar responsibilities.

Employee absenteeism becomes apparent when workers don’t communicate about their attendance or struggle to fulfill their required responsibilities, especially during busy or high-pressure periods.

How to tell the difference between absenteeism and reasonable absence

For example, occasional transportation issues outside an employee’s control are generally not considered absenteeism. However, if that employee starts canceling their shift at the last minute on a weekly basis, their one-time issue can become a case of absenteeism in the workplace.

Types of absences

Now that you know how absenteeism is defined, keep in mind that your employees may miss work for many reasons. Many of these absences, however, aren’t necessarily absenteeism.

The main types of absences at work include:

• Approved absences: Requested, permitted absences for holidays, parental or medical leave, jury duty or a leave of absence.
• Occasional employee absences: Unplanned absences due to unexpected obligations, including illness, bereavement and childcare.
• Virtual absenteeism: Appearing online and active but not actually being present or performing work duties.
• Chronic absenteeism: Intentional or habitual absence without employer approval.

What causes absenteeism?

Absenteeism generally isn’t as simple as an unwillingness to work and can often imply underlying issues.

Some causes of staff absenteeism may include:

• Childcare or elder care: Employees may miss work due to childcare or elder care needs, such as unexpected illnesses.
• Injuries: This includes acute and chronic injuries resulting from accidents at work.
• Health issues: Illness or medical appointments commonly cause employees to miss work, especially during cold and flu season.
• Low morale: Heavy workloads and high-pressure environments can lead to burnout, stress and low morale, causing employees to miss work.
• Disengagement: Employees who don’t feel connected to their jobs or engaged with your company’s mission may lack the motivation to attend work.
• Harassment: Unchecked bullying and harassment could cause employees to avoid their workplace.

The impacts of absenteeism

While employees miss work for many valid reasons, ignoring work absenteeism issues at your business can lead to an unproductive company culture and disrupt the workflow of your team. Small attendance issues can eventually grow and have negative effects that span across your organization.

Establish an employee attendance policy

An attendance policy sets guidelines and expectations relating to employee attendance. Many employees miss work or aren’t held accountable because the company lacks a clear attendance policy.

How to create and maintain an absence policy

Consider these steps to develop and enforce your company’s attendance policy:

1. Choose an appropriate buffer

When creating your attendance policy, make sure absenteeism is defined in a way that employees can understand. Decide how many absences an employee can take before it becomes an issue and when lateness becomes problematic.

2. Create escalation levels

Decide on a consistent warning system to address tardiness. For example, you may want to consider starting with a verbal warning, moving to a written warning next time and putting them on probation after additional offenses, depending on what escalation process you decide on.

3. Track attendance issues

Develop a system for tracking employee attendance issues to create a clear record of employee behavior to use as evidence when addressing staff absenteeism. Even a simple spreadsheet can prove extremely helpful in maintaining awareness of work absenteeism on your team.

4. Open lines of communication

Create a clear system that employees must use to communicate about possible absences. Determine who employees can contact if they expect to miss a day, want to trade shifts or need to leave work early.

Opening lines of communication prevents unreported absences and helps management avoid logistical problems associated with unexpected absences at work.

5. Enforce rules consistently

Once you have a policy in place, apply it consistently. While all employees have different life circumstances, consistency when enforcing the company attendance policy may help reduce the risks of favoritism.

6. Post the policy prominently

Include the attendance policy in the employee handbook and post it in a common location if you have employees who report to work in person. Even if your team doesn’t have issues with absenteeism in the workplace, regularly remind them of company policies to keep standards high.

7. Address unscheduled absences

If you notice unscheduled or repeated absences at work, consider addressing the problem early before it escalates. Checking in with employees helps communicate attendance expectations and helps ensure employees aren’t struggling with underlying issues.

Disciplinary action isn’t always necessary, but depending on your policy, some employees may require it due to habitual absences that affect work performance.

Tips for encouraging good attendance

There are several ways you can encourage an employee to return to work after periods of absence. Consider these steps to address the problem:

1. Find the root cause

Have a discussion about why they’ve been calling in or showing up late to work due to personal issues. Having an open-door policy provides an environment where employees can be more confident in discussing these issues without repercussions.

Additionally, workplace bullying could also lead to days off due to stress. Helping an employee to escalate these concerns appropriately with your human resources team could be a solution.

2. Have the company policy in hand

When speaking with employees, have a copy of the company policy. This lets you directly compare their behavior to the agreed-upon expectations of their positions.

Providing employees with a justification for your concerns can show them how their absences at work impact the team. It also demonstrates that you hold them to the same standards as other employees.

3. Provide wellbeing support

Employees may take absences due to a disability or health reasons. There are several different approaches to this:

• Providing car shares so that people can get to work more easily
• Offering reasonable accommodations to adapt the office space to an employee’s disability
• Providing flexible working hours and remote work
• Using Employee Assistance Programs (EAPs) to support employees with personal or work-related concerns, through confidential assessments and counseling sessions

4. Create an improvement plan

When meeting with employees, set clear timelines for expected improvements. Work with them to track attendance and discuss the next steps if the issue continues. Improvement steps might include daily manager check-ins, weekly schedule reviews, or requiring the employee to clock in and out for lunch.

5. Schedule future check-ins

Arrange regular meetings to assess progress and ensure they’re resolving the causes of their work absenteeism. If employees know they have meetings with management coming up, they may work harder to show growth and progress.

6. Get employee feedback

Asking employees why they’re missing work helps them feel heard and validated, potentially boosting morale. To get the answers you need about staff absenteeism, speak to employees one-on-one, host meetings to discuss changes or distribute anonymous surveys about absences and work conditions.

Absenteeism is caused by a number of factors, and the reasons will differ from employee to employee. By establishing an effective employee attendance policy, you can set clear rules for attendance in the workplace. This provides clear guidelines for identifying absenteeism and following up on any concerns with an improvement plan or reasonable accommodations.