Managing Employee Absence - Essay Example

Student Name: Instructor’s Name: Title: Assess the ways in which contemporary organizations can manage employee absence Course: Institution: Managing employee absence Introduction Contemporary organizations have adopted various ways for managing employee absence. An appropriate method for managing employee absence is one that takes into consideration the number of employees absent at, availability of expertise, and organizational demands on the management team. Managing employee absence is important as it has an impact on the organization. Making sure that deadlines are met and customers are satisfied is the major reason why organizations may decide to manage employee absence rather than cost (Torrington, Taylor, Hall and Atkinson, 2011). There are many ways an organization can manage both the planned and unplanned employee absence. Unplanned absence can result in more immediate demands on directors to choose if to take action and the type of action to take. However, generally absence, whether short or long-term, has a significant impact on the type of action to take. The long term absence produces a different potential and demands for action than that of short term absence (Bratton and Gold, 2012). A number of different managers may participate in deciding if action is required as well as what type of action to take. In some cases, for instance, in specialized roles allowing great autonomy, particularly for short term planned absence, it is mainly up to employees to manage their own workload. Financial organizations have adopted self-managing teams. The team members jointly make the decision about the type of action required. Frequently, line or project manager are the one assigned this task, even though HR would offer support and guidance as needed (Armstrong, 2011). Methods for managing employee absence Unplanned absence Small organizations are not likely to have spare employees. They are likely to have more work than they can really handle. Managers in such organizations take actions like overtime, motivating their employees to work a little harder, managers coming in to work for those absent and even working for more hours than normal and those not present putting in extra hours on their return. Large organizations have more resources and spare capacity. However, dealing with unplanned absence is also a challenge to the. They have several ways they can use to cover for unplanned absence, but the method to use rely on factors like, the urgency of work, the type of customer relationships, the general level of absence, the flexibility of expertise, the affected department demanding level as well as the demanding levels of other departments. The first step towards covering for unplanned absence is to make your mind up whether to cover or not to cover the absence. The next step is to look for an employee within the current team, or other units in the same organization. If the organization does not have internal spare capacity and the work must be covered, it can look for external employees (Bevan and Heron, 1999). Unplanned absence can be left uncovered for some days with no major difficulties happening when the work involve a project. Where the project job entails a bigger team, a few days’ absence may normally not have a big effect. It is the responsibility of the project manager to examine their project plan and make a decision whether or not the tasks may be left uncovered for some time or work must be shared between the other employees. Absence from particular organization critical positions like till operation must always be covered (Erwin and Iverson, 1994). The next alternative is to call back employees from their planned leave periods to work overtime: The manager need to look at the schedule to find out who is on leave. This is the best alternative; though, because overtime is the usual way by which basic employment levels are attained, it might not produce an enough number of workers to as well cover up for absence. In this case, the next alternative is to look at internal moves from another unit in the store, especially those jaded and desiring change. The other way to cover unplanned absence is to properly share the work between the existing employees and managers (Taylor, Cunningham, Newsome and Schlolarios, 2010). Tasks that entail regular contact with clientele or that are important in providing good services must be covered. For instance, call centers must have enough employees to take care of the normal number of phone calls. Furthermore, large stores must have enough employees to maintain till operation and shelves stocked. Still, back office activities must function at a level to make sure that at least the critical activities take place. In addition, the school program cannot be left unsupervised (Cole and Kleiner, 1992). In large organizations which have an internal employment market, it is regularly the case that workers have worked in a number of different departments. This implies that they possess a variety of skill and knowledge that can be used in covering absence. For example, in financial institutions, many employees have worked in the complaint’s unit or have knowledge of handling complaints in their own department and hence if required these employees can be utilized to cover the absence in the complaint’s unit (Harrison and Martocchio, 1998). The other way to manage unplanned absence is to use ‘sweep’ teams, which is a team of professionals who are highly trained in usual as well as professional practices. They cover up for the absence among professionals from a number of teams within a large geographical region. However, this should be the last alternative and only used when there is no option of internal cover. Sweep team size differs depending on the existing needs for cover. For instance, schools can expand it during school vacations and the winter (Reynolds, 1990). It is usually probable to cover for unplanned absence by way of ‘flexing’ hours in organizations that have flexible working patterns. For example, within the call centre, many employees are ready to work for more hours or special hours to cover up for unplanned absence. Also, the food retailer depends on a broad variety of part-time as well as flexible working patterns and hence may call on employees to work for more hours or extra shifts if required. The manufacturing industries utilize overtime where probable to cover absence. In case absence levels are very high, managers may look for volunteers to work extra shifts. Employees may use flexible working hours reduce their own absence. For instance, sometimes an employee may be required to handle a domestic issue, go home to give birth, or to be present at a school occasion. Flexible working planning, incorporating home working can reduce absence for these sorts of reasons (Haccoun and Desgent, 1993). Bringing in an external employee to cover for unplanned absence, particularly short-tern absence is not a good option. This is because many jobs need skills and knowledge that are not readily accessible in the labor market or else via an agency at short notice. For instance, it may be supposed that a variety of call centre as well as back office jobs are fairly simple, but in the call centre all workers require a good knowledge of the organization and goods and services it provides. To become an expert in the job it requires an employee to go for training for six months for an employee. The knowledge required is not something that a temporary worker can acquire fast (Evans and Palmer, 1997). It’s only in teaching and secretarial roles that external employees are brought in to cover for absence without problems. Frequently, managers unwilling to call temporary employees to cover for short-tem absence in secretarial jobs since they may not have knowledge of the specific word processing or else modes of presentation utilized. However, they might be forced to use temporary employees if they don’t have internal capacity and the work must be done. In this case, they might decide to do some reallocation of roles so as temporary employees are assigned more basic activities while internal employees take those tasks involving organizational particular knowledge and skill. It is important for human resource managers to endeavor to work with some agencies in order to be able to bring in temporary employees with prior knowledge of the organization. Organizations demonstrate substantial flexibility in managing unplanned absence. In some cases, absence may be covered by less important or urgent tasks being called off or postponed, for instance, training as well as team briefings (CIPD, 2012). Planned absence Unplanned and planned absences are almost managed using similar ways. The only difference is that planned absence is identified in advance. Being aware of absence is very vital because it gives employees or their managers an opportunity to plan the kind of cover required. There is an association between the duration of absence, the type of work and the urgency of deadlines (Bratton and Gold, 2012). The methods used to manage short-tem absence are similar to those used to manage unplanned absence. Frequently, the first step should be to decide if cover is required or if the job may be covered by use of existing employees. One major difference is that, since the absence is identified in advance, it may be credible to bring work ahead. An employee may be capable of planning their workload in advance in order that, with the exception of an emergency, nothing main has to be covered when they are on leaves (Armstrong, 2011). A good example of a planned absence is annual leave that every employee is entitled to. Employees who are accountable for their individual workload may make sure that they do not take leave during a busy time or else when deadlines are near. They should also make sure that the work can be postponed or else that another person may carry on with it in their absence (Bycio, 1992). Long-term planned absence, like maternity leave, sick leave and career breaks, also apply the same process, but majority cases of long-term absence call for long-term planning. The first step is to look for existing employees who can cover for this absence. Bringing in external employees should be a last resort. A HR manager may decide to temporary promote a junior employee to occupy the vacant post (Torrington, et.al. 2011). Clerical and administration posts are most often filled by an external employee. Since planned absence is identified in advance, it is possible to train an external employee than when the absence is unplanned. Some organizations use temporary employees whereas others favor a fixed-term contract. Each has its advantages as well as disadvantages. Temporary employees tend to be very costly because of the agency charge and regularly demonstrate less devotion to an organization. They can leave any time a good and attractive opportunity presents itself. Employing an employee on a fixed-term contract is more reliable and more probable to remain devoted to the organization during the contract (Bevan and Heron, 1999). Conclusion There are several ways an organization can use to manage employee absence. To choose which method to use, an organization must take into account various factors: the length of absence, the overall degree of absence during that time, the degree of possible replacement with existing employees and urgent and short-tem organizational activities. The best method to manage employee absence is by the use of internal employees; use of external employees should be the last resort. Both unplanned and planned absence can be managed by use of similar methods, which include: overtime, internal moves, calling back employees from leave, use of formerly chosen back-ups and drawing on the internal pool of reserve like ‘sweep’ teams. Long-term planned absence can be managed by means of temporary promotion, delegating tasks to existing employees, temporary contract and fixed contracts. 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