Cooperman wrote:
Maybe the answer is an 'attendance bonus' for achieving 97%+ attendance in the year.
Hmm, isn't that a bit of a sticking plaster solution though? It could also potentially act as a source of resentment between a worker who genuinely needs to take just enough sick leave to push them under the bonus cut-off point, but who is otherwise a model employee giving 100% every day they're at work, and a colleague who turns up every day but does the bare minimum required, and contributes less overall to the business throughout the year.
I'd prefer to see more companies which have significant absenteeism problems take a deep breath and ask themselves awkward/embarrassing questions such as "why do so many of our employees seem to hate working here, and what can we change/which managers do we need to retrain/fire to make things better for them?" If nothing is done to improve the working environment, style of management, levels of understaffing/overloading or whatever is at the heart of the problem, then attendance might well improve, but morale/attentiveness to detail/pride in ones work will probably still be down in the gutter.