Causes of Absenteeism and High Turnover of Staff

You have been employees as the human resource manger of a company. You have checked through the company record on turnover of absenteeism in the company for the past 6 months.

Identify the causes of absenteeism and high turnover staffs in your company.

Absenteeism occurs when employees are not present at work when they are scheduled to be there. It can be divided into voluntary or involuntary absenteeism. Involuntary absence is viewed to be beyond the employee’s immediate control; legitimate reasons like personal illness, accidents or family emergencies. Voluntary absence is under the direct control of the employee which can often be traced back to other factors such as a poor work environment, job dissatisfaction and other issues. If such absences become excessive, they can have a seriously adverse impact on a company’s operations and, ultimately, its profitability.

The causes of absenteeism and high turnover staff are:

Low wages: The prospect of getting higher pay elsewhere is one of the most obvious contributors to turnover. Every industry has organizations that pay well and some that pay low. Employees might stay a little longer in times of recession because no other work is available, but they know they’re being exploited and will be looking for a way out.

Work environment: Turnover tends to be higher in environments where employees feel they are taken advantage of, where they feel undervalued or ignored, and where they feel helpless or unimportant. Clearly, if managers are impersonal, arbitrary, and demanding, there is greater risk of alienation and turnover.

Management policies: Management policies can also affect the environment which can lead to high turnover as well. In a way such as whether employee benefits and incentives appear generous or stingy, or whether the company is responsive to employees’ needs and wants. Management’s handling of major corporate events such as mergers or layoffs is also an important influence on the work environment afterwards.

Weak team leadership: Even if someone has been trained to do a specific job, they are usually working as part of team. They are alongside people with complementary roles, who together deliver a process or solution. If team lack strong leadership they will not function well, which will lead to disagreements and relationship breakdown.

Poor training: Asking employees often to do a job but not giving them adequate training will in fact de-motivate the employees and hence allow them to leave the company.

Work stress: Work stress experienced at particular types of jobs can also create turnover.

Seasonal changes: seasonal changes such as the beginning of a school year can cause high turnover when part-timer, school-age employees return to their classrooms.

Demographically specific: Some turnover is demographically specific, particularly for women who are balancing significant work and family duties at the same time. Such women (or men) may choose to leave a company instead of sacrificing their other interests and responsibilities in order to make the job work out. These factors translate into higher turnover rates for women in many companies.

Inequitable evaluation: while preparing the performance appraisal of an employee, some mangers will unfairly evaluate the employees’ performance which in fact de-motivate them and hence lead to high turnover rate.

Strained communications between management and employee: When a lack of communication exists in the organizational setting it has the potential to cause significant problems between management and employees.

For each case identified above, suggest way(s) in which the staffs can be motivated to remedy the situation.

Low wages: according to F W Taylor, the motive for hard work is high wages. The company has to pay high wages to their employees in order to remedy the situation.

Work environment: the manger must give high and equal importance to all of his employees, so that they feel who valuable they are to the company and therefore will be motivated to remedy the situation.

Management policies: the management policies should meet the employees’ expectation. Providing them incentive and benefits to motivate them to remedy the situation.

Weak team leadership: Teams perform at their best under clear leadership, where someone has a vision of how the team should work and the level at which it should perform.

Poor training: the company must provide with an accurate account of training to their employees to develop their knowledge in those skills and aptitudes which contribute to the welfare of the company and employees.

Work stress: the manger must give their employees with a certain number jobs which the employees can able handle and accomplish smoothly at a given time.

Seasonal changes: at the time of evaluation and selection the manager must avoid selecting part-timers, or at the time of evaluation the manger must take into consideration the number of hours that the employee can give to the company and the length of his service in order to reduce the turnover rate.

Demographically specific: at the time of evaluation, mangers must select those women who are unmarried.

Inequitable evaluation: the management must evaluate the employees’ performance fairly with specific concentrating on his/her performance.

Strained communications between management and employee: Improving communication between management and employees requires a focus on effective communication and leadership management. The following are some important keys to an effective communication:

• Clarity
• Active Listening
• Patience
• Honesty
• Awareness of Body Language

Question 2

You are the human resource management of the company. Explain how you identify a particular individual for training.

Everyone has personal and often unique training and development needs. Such needs may be the result of ambition, career progression, inadequate job performance, or simply to meet changing demands of job or occupation. The purpose of this handout is to outline the process of identifying individual training and development needs and the involvement of the trainer.

NO

Is Performance Correctable?

Is Performance Satisfactory?

Is Performance Satisfactory?

YES

By asking some of these basic questions, it can be able to roughly categorize people and their respective job performance. The outcome of this exercise is to group people into three broad categories.

People whose job performance is unsatisfactory and for whom training is probably a necessity.

People whose job performance is satisfactory, but may need training in order to maintain this level of performance.

People whose job performance is more than satisfactory and whose need for training is for development purposes.

Using these categories as a starting point the trainer can ask more detailed question about a person, gradually building up a picture of the individual and using it to identify training needs.

To ensure that the training is effective and meet the objectives of the organization, explain how training should be conducted.

People must be interested in learning and be willing to learn before they will accept training.

The operational objectives of the training should be known by those responsible for it and by those involved in it. Time constraints and performance standards should be predetermined and also made known.

Training must be geared to the individual needs of those being trained and be seen to be so.

Training must be done either by supervisor or manger, or by an agency acting within a pattern fully understood and approved by the supervisor or manger, and which he will subsequently maintain and reinforce.

The rate of training should equal the rate at which an individual can learn, and this should be confirmed by testing.

People can learn by being told or shown how to do work, but best of all from the personal involvement of doing wok accepted standards under skilled coaching.

Training should be planned, executed and evaluated systematically, in the context of organizational needs.

Discuss the issues in the article.

According to the article the Singapore government has setup S$600 million to train the workers to develop their knowledge & skill. The employers will get higher subsides, up to 90% of course fees, for workers who attend programmes at any continuing education and training centre. For the first time, the low-skilled will be paid $4 for every hour that they are on course.

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The higher-skilled can get up to $1,000 a month while on training. Half the amount will be use to develop training centre and the rest will be paid out to employers, workers and jobless Singaporeans o course. This will have a great impact on the country’s economy. The unemployment rate will significantly drop and by this great strategy of the government, it will effectively reduce the high turnover rates in the companies and will develop their skills to a certain level.