Absenteeism & Labour Turnover - Literature review Example

Name: Professor: Institution: Course: Date: Ever successful company must have a reliable and mindful employees who are involve in how the firm is run. Their input into the procedures and policies for better quality on the sale and delivery of the company’s service or product can greatly aid the company. Employees are perceived to be a very important asset to every organization. However, employee absenteeism and labour turnover are the major problems that affect companies operations. According to Armstrong (2009), absenteeism refers to the practice of workers absence from their duties when they are normally schedule to work. Absenteeism is the practice an absentee at work and an absentee is the worker who habitually stays away from work. According to UK Labour Bureau, “absenteeism is the total man shifts lost as a result of absence as percentage of total number of man shifts scheduled to work”. On the other hand, labour turnover refers to the ratio of the number of workers that leave a company through resignation, dismissal or attrition during a period of time to the number of workers on payroll during the same period. This essay will focus on the causes of employee absenteeism and labour turnover in UK companies and how the human resource managers can manage this problem. Employees absenteeism in UK companies is caused by dozens of interrelated factors which make it even more difficult to “quantify, qualify, or rectify” (Tylczak , 2009, p.1). The causes of absenteeism can be divided in to three, namely; job situation factors, personal factors and attendance factors. Job situation include; stress where it is estimated that about 40 million working days are lost in the UK because of stress. This can be attributed to poor working conditions, work load, role conflict or ambiguity, shift work, organization climate and relationship (Luongo 2010). Job scope has also caused absenteeism in UK companies where a high level of task repetitiveness is associated with absenteeism. Management style is also factor that can cause absenteeism since the quality of management of these companies mostly that of immediate supervisors has affected the level of absenteeism. Other job situation factors that has caused absenteeism include; frequent job transfers, physical working conditions and work group size where in UK, the larger the company the high the absence rate. Personal factors are some of the other causes of absenteeism. According to Armstrong (2009 P.514), in UK, younger employees are frequently absent as compared to the old. Also, women are more prone to sickness absence as compared to men. Other person factors such as dealing with personal business, break from routing, leisure time and a break from co-workers are also causes of absenteeism. According to Armstrong (2009 P.514), unsafe working conditions can cause high absenteeism. Finally, family responsibilities, transportation and accidents are some of attendance factors causing absenteeism in UK companies (Saxena 2009). Change industrial process, reduced quality of work as a result of discontinuance of a company, industrial depression and seasonal fluctuation are some of the cause for occurrence of labour turnover in UK companies. According to Farlex (2011), bad relation of employees with the management has caused labour turnover in most companies in UK. Also, low wages, the, less opportunities, poor working conditions and nature of work also create a problem of labour turnover. At times, employees are involved in the activities of labour union where in many situations, these activities creates conflicts with the management which in turn causes labour turnover to occur (Assar 2011), Personal problems such as accidents, employee’s poor health, superannuation and death can also cause labour turnover. “Job performance is a relatively new factor that researchers are examining for its ability to predict turnover within companies in UK” (Armstrong 2009 P.501). They have found that there is a relationship between job performance and labour turnover. Poor performing employees tend to quit more often as compared to higher performing employees. Some workers are also determined to getting attractive job in any other company or industry as a result of unsatisfied condition in their current jobs which has lead to labour turnover in those particular companies in UK. Finally, bad requirement by the top management has also lead to the occurrence of labour turnover. Human resource managers can undertake the following measures to solve the problem of absenteeism. First, the company should review its absence management policies and also assess how line managers interpret them. They should also review how these policies are communicated to workers, such as recording and reporting system for absences. Any factors that are contributing to increasing workers stress should be indentified and reduced to manage stress. Also, the companies should review the capability of the line managers to deal with these issues and how well they understand how the causal factors operate. These companies should also offer workplace financial assistance for workers in difficulty, e.g. access to financial counseling. Examine how well are the current initiatives are fairing, for example, if they are accessible to all workers who are in need of them and whether they are encourage to use them. The HR managers should also monitor and evaluate level of employee wellbeing and health which should also include the effectiveness of all targeted interventions. There are possible actions to deal with subordinate turnover problems. To start with, companies should deal with unfair and uncompetitive payment system. Jobs should be designed to maximize task significance, control over work and feedback, skill variety, autonomy and also ensure that they create opportunity for growth and learning. A number of roles can be customized so as to meet the need of specific individuals. Develop commitment to the work by organizing work around projects with which employees can identify more readily than the organization as a whole and also encourage employees to develop social ties with the company. Managers should ensure that promotion and selection procedures are in line with the individual capacity to the demand of the task they have to undertake. All unpleasant working conditions should be eliminated and take steps to improve work life balance by creating policies which includes flexible working that recognize the need of employees outside work. Companies should also reduce the losses of workers who cannot adjust to their new job by providing support and training when they join the company. In conclusion, the human resource manager should identify those factors that influence turnovers and absenteeism. To solve these problems, the management should separate controllable factors from uncontrollable. Provision of company policies, practices and procedures is also important for reducing labour turnover and absenteeism. References Armstrong M (2009) Armstrong’s handbook of human resource management practice British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data, London http://www.murshed.khanhouse.org/education/Armstrongs_Handbook_of_Human_Resource_Management.pdf Assar R (2011), What are the causes of labour turnover, Retrieved on 1st May from http://www.rajputbrotherhood.com/knowledge-hub/cost-accounting/what-are-the-causes-of-labor-turnover.html Farlex (2011), Managing absenteeism Retrieved on 1st May from http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Managing+absenteeism.(Checklist+058)-a0141751173 Luongo E.P (2010) actors that may contribute employees Absenteeism in UK, Retrieved on 1st May from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1577980/ Saxena R 2009, Dissertation Report On “Absenteeism of Employee” At Indchemie Health Specialties Pvt. Ltd in UK Tylczak, L. (2009). Attacking absenteeism: Positive solutions to an age-old problem-A practical guide to help slash absenteeism Menlo Park, California : CRISP Publications, Inc. Read More