Absenteeism in corporate South Africa explained by the comprehensive report

The CAMS Baseline Report on Absenteeism (entitled The Vanishing Workforce), based on research undertaken by Corporate Absenteeism Management Solutions (CAMS) and analysed by labour specialist Andrew Levy - outline several key patterns with regards to corporate absenteeism in South Africa.

“Absenteeism is, in all probability, the single biggest cause of lost time and poor productivity that this country faces. Across the economy, it is probable that the minimum cost of absenteeism, measured as a direct cost only, will be about R19.144 billion. The statistics surrounding the incidence of absenteeism are sufficient for us to examine its incidence distributed by variables such as age, gender and job, which tends to be significant," says labour specialist Andrew Levy.

Chief Executive of CAMS, Johnny Johnson, says that by analysing their own absenteeism information and comparing this to national norms, individual employers are in a very powerful position to manage absenteeism, and by reducing it, to make commensurate improvements in costs and in productivity.

“This research shows that by far the greatest manifestation of absence is one day or less – in this case, some thirty five percent of all observations. It was shown that over 50% of all absence measured in our sample was short term – i.e. less than two days, while less than 20% was four days or more.

“From this data, it is immediately obvious that the bulk of sick leave abuse, as well as the greatest benefit of savings for the employer, will lie in dealing with the short term nature of the problem. The disruptive effects of short-term absence are far more acute than longer-term absence," Johnson says.

Johnson says that longer-term incapacity is a relatively less frequent occurrence, but at around one case in five, is still worthy of management attention, although it does bring a different approach into focus.

In this survey, 63% of companies said there was a pattern to absence. "Given that attendance at work is a calendar occurrence, there are only a limited number of patterns that would show up and these will do so relatively quickly – the most frequent being Mondays and/or Fridays, or before and after long weekends/public holidays. The data shows that 52.1% of all absence recorded relates to Monday, Friday or both," he says.

Levy says, “This then becomes a relatively easy manifestation of abuse to identify and deal with. It is highly unlikely that there are medical conditions, which arrive on the weekend with such reliability and regularity. A period, which requires special consideration, falls in December, which can be usefully taken to be from 16th Dec – 2nd January. For many production environments this may be a period of factory shut down, but in any event, is always a period of lesser economic activity, as much of the nation takes its summer break.”

Levy says that employer options for this period are numerous, and range from compulsory leave, of a paid or unpaid variety, or scheduling a lesser level of manning and activity and accepting that many of the staff who are actually there in body, will be absent in spirit.

Johnson adds, “It was also noted that higher absence is positively correlated with lower incomes, lesser responsibilities, as well as more repetitive and less satisfying work. International studies confirm this observation and it is clear that manual employees have consistently higher levels of absence than their white-collar compatriots
He says that with regards to devising a national norm for absenteeism it should be noted there would be wide variances between public and private sector, size of firm, age and gender profile of the labour force, and the nature of the work that they do.

“Even under these circumstances, it is still important to devise a single figure to represent so many possible variations because it gives us an estimate of which direction we are moving in from year to year, we can estimate the national cost of absenteeism and this allows us to make comparisons.

“Such a figure is of great value to employers, who can also see, at a glance how they stand in relation to the national average. However, in order to understand the position more fully, the employer also needs to benchmark its data with comparable information from similar firms, and by monitoring its own performance from period to period."

Johnson concludes by saying that on the positive side, the regular abuse of sick leave is usually limited to a small number of employees, who abuse it regularly, and in patterns which are readily discernible.

Levy adds, “The consequence of this, is that the employer who wishes to tackle the problem, may do so, secure in the knowledge that if he approaches it correctly, he will make significant inroads into the management of the problem."