Comments on: National Sickie Day – You suffering?

By: Ruth Thompson

Ruth Thompson — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 16:47:44 +0000

You’ve totally hit the nail on the head there Dawn. What’s so amazing about this is how simple it can be. A frank exchange of views seems like a simple thing to do but with lots of managers afraid of what they might hear or how they might be perceived…..then the simple solution becomes the hardest thing in the world.

By: Dawn Baird

Dawn Baird — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 14:14:09 +0000

I think that having a frank exchange of views with employees would be better than tallying sick days. Sometimes people take off sick because of stress, lack of motivation, lack of engagement. If the sources of those things could be addressed, employers would notice a massive decrease in illegitimate “sickies”.

By: Ruth Thompson

Ruth Thompson — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 14:05:03 +0000

Thanks Chris – for the important expansion on the impact not considering employee engagement has on business. You are absolutely correct at how far-reaching the impact of POV has on culture and the success of any change being implemented. Not taking your employees needs or opinions into consideration is a risk that no manager should think is worth taking…

By: Chris Clarke

Chris Clarke — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 13:59:10 +0000

This understanding of the employee stakeholder Point Of View (POV) has many practical applications beyond the reuction in illicit sick days (important though that is). Where organisations are planning changes of any kind that impact the employees, they are stakeholders in that change and their POV in respect of that change must be understood and accommodated. Therefore specific focus must be placed on the employees experience of previous change, their belief in the capability of the organisation to manage change in general and this change in particular, and the alignment of this change with the organisational culture (bearing in mind that organisational culture is not homogenous and different stakeholder groups will have subtley different cultural perspectives). If specific activities are not undertaken to discover and account for these elements of the employees POV, the kind of corporate atmosphere that leads to participation in National Sickie Day (or worse) is likely to prevail and the change be thwarted from the outset.