On work sickness...

[annwfyn]

I was reading this this morning and felt the usual wrench in my stomach.

I hate articles like this. I hate them with a fiery passion.

Maybe there are people out there, who skive off every Monday, but I know way more people who struggle into work whilst every muscle in their body is aching, and they are shivering slightly with fever because 'I've already had too many days off sick'. Maybe there are people who just don't bother, who would be vastly motivated by the abolition of sick pay, but I think there would be more people suffering from serious conditions like cancer who's illness were being seriously worsened by the stress of not being able to pay their rent/mortgage. Maybe the majority of sick days do come from people who are just lazy, as this article suggests, but I think I've seen more people take time off because they had pneumonia, or a fever of 103 degrees, or couldn't actually talk and could only make little croaking noises.

I hate articles like this because I don't think we are a nation of skivers. I think we're a nation of workaholics, with a vastly distorted notion on the importance of work.

I think the kind of 'drag yourself into work, no matter what' culture will actually lose businesses a lot more money in terms of decreased productivity, when it becomes the norm for every virus to go all the way around the office, and to keep going as people insist on coming in, sitting listlessly at their desk for the day, and then staggering home, never quite getting better and passing the disease on to everyone they know.

And finally, I am fairly sure that in the world that that writer lives in, it wouldn't be possible for anyone with long term health problems to get a job at all. Why would any of these tough go getting companies with no tolerance for human weakness hire someone with arthritis, or chronic asthma? And who the hell is going to pay for those people to eat if that world came to pass?

Gah! And argh!

Comments

[pmp.livejournal.com]

Out of interest, how would you organise the day to day running?

Take the NHS as an example, it's been clearly proven that letting staff roster themselves cuts down on sick leave. However, what you frequently get is shifts with 6 nurses working and shifts with 1 nurse and a HCA. This leads to staff becoming sick more often from the really hectic days and thus take more genuine sickdays.

I'm not saying I don't agree with the idea that we need to be more flexible, nor do I agree with the article linked, but the ideal world is a long way from pratical.

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

It's only a minority of jobs which really work like that tho.

In your average office job, most people can work perfectly well from home and most people won't desperately negatively impact on their office if they are away for a while.

What jobs specifically do you think could not be done with more generous sick leave and flexible working patterns?

[pmp.livejournal.com]

Maybe I worry about it not working because I know that *I* couldn't cope with flexi-time and working from home. I lack self-motivation and would struggle to cope with having to organise myself. I don't think I'm in a minority about this either.

I also know that I've struggled into work when I've been ill because I need to keep going and that if I stop, I'll curl up into a little ball for a while.


With regards to jobs that don't work well with better sick leave and working patterns are those that require a specific number of people to do the job properly. Things like the NHS definately struggle when they're short staffed and patient care suffers drastically.

As I said, I don't disagree with the sentiments you express, I'm struggling to visualise it being practical in all circumstances, though to be fair the same could be said of a system that forces you to work when you're ill either.


One point I also missed earlier, they conclude that large companies suffer from higher sickness rates because people prefer to mooch off the company. Surely though it's more accurate to say, that in a big company you're less likely to be absolutely essential, therefore you're less motivated to push yourself into the ground. In a small company where you're the only one who can do your job, you know if you don't go in, then you'll have twice as much work when you do come back.

[lanfykins.livejournal.com]

I think it's more to do with large corporations being inflexible and soulless, whereas small companies are a lot more trusting of their employees and make allowances for individual differences. I had three times the sick days at Misys that I do at Exony, and that was entirely due to stress, lack of flexibility, and lack of support.

Lack of flexibility
I lived over an hour's drive away, but working from home wasn't permitted, and neither was working slightly later hours (although, strangely, working slightly earlier hours was fine). I'm naturally an evening person; having to get up at 7am every day and do a round trip of three hours or more (because of course I hit rush hour on the M4) exhausted me and trashed my immune system. I started getting ill a lot.

Lack of support
HR noticed that I was getting ill a lot. They sent me to a doctor, who asked me if there was any reason my immune system might be trashed. When I suggested exhaustion, I was told that it was my responsibility to get enough sleep. The doctor sent a note to my HR saying that she could find no reason for me to be regularly ill. HR also took this opportunity to criticise my timekeeping, and told me that I must be in by 9am every day. At no point were my concerns listened to. My request to be permitted to work 10-6.30 occasionally was dismissed out of hand.

Stress
From this point on, it was clear that HR viewed me as a malingerer, despite all my most recent absences having doctor's notes confirming that I had tonsillitis. They gave me an 'improvement plan' that set a maximum number of sick days. They reminded me that I was nearing the threshold after which I would be receiving only statutory sick pay. Any time I sneezed or had a sore throat I panicked, knowing I had to drag myself into work however ill I was or I risked discipinary proceedings. I couldn't concentrate on my work, which suffered badly (and I got hauled over the coals for that too). I started excusing myself to the ladies' to cut myself.
So I left.

When I started work at Exony, I was commuting down the A34 every day. But they told me that I could work flexible hours and from home.

So I wandered into the office at about 9.30 and worked from home most Thursdays, and lo: despite equally late nights and an equally hectic social life and even these days working a second job, I am not ill.

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

Maybe I worry about it not working because I know that *I* couldn't cope with flexi-time and working from home. I lack self-motivation and would struggle to cope with having to organise myself. I don't think I'm in a minority about this either.

I don't know about 'majority' or 'minority', but I know in general I'm very much the kind of person who benefits from flexi-time. I work well to deadlines, and am much happier if I can manage my own time, and work in a comfortable environment.

I've also noticed that my sickness record tends to get much worse without flexi-time. If I'm working in an environment with flexi-time, I'll have days when I get up, I've got a sore throat and I feel like crap. I'll think "it's OK - I only have to go in for a couple of hours, then I'll take a long lunch, have a short afternoon, and be home by 5 pm". If I'm in a company that doesn't have that, and I know that if I go in to work, I'm stuck there til 6 pm, no matter how much worse I feel, I'm about 75% more likely to just call in sick.

Maybe I'm unusual, but I've found that there's a definite 'zone' of sickness, where you're not quite well enough for a long commute/long day/heavy workload, but probably could potter along and do a little bit. Flexi-time lets me work when I'm in that zone, instead of pushing me into a binary choice.