How to Manage Your Company's Absenteeism Rate

It is well-known that absenteeism is costly, so that it is often admitted that a 1-to-1 ratio exists between the company's absenteeism rate and its cost in percents of the total payroll. This is due to the fact that the replacement and management of absent collaborators needs to be financed and that this situation causes additional costs in terms of overtime work and disorganization. This calculation however only partially accounts for the total indirect costs incurred by the company, which include the damage to the corporate image, a lesser quality of its services and even possibly a drop in the level of motivation of the more assiduous collaborators.

The command of the company’s absenteeism rate is thus critical to the management of a company, for when it reaches a certain level, it will impact the health of the organization itself. Moreover, it is most likely that all new employees who join a "diseased" organization will themselves be "contaminated".