The CIPD and Active Health Partners jointly commissioned research to statistically analyse AHP’s vast and unique database on employee absence. The research team consisted of Peter Spurgeon of the Institute of Clinical Leadership, University of Warwick, Patti Mazelan and Fred Barwell of Applied Research Ltd, Birmingham and Hugh Flanagan of Organisational Research and Consultancy Network (International) Ltd. The full report from the study is available to purchase from the CIPD Bookstore.
The database collected data from 40 different organisations and comprising over 80,000 individual absence spells associated with approximately 30,000 individual employees and relating to a large number of companies from across a range of industries and sectors.
The data analysed was particularly valuable because:
- Employees of companies involved report all unplanned absence to a central nurse contact centre on a 24-hour 7-days-a-week basis
- Qualified nurses, trained in occupational health, use a standardised software package to code the start and end of each absence
- The reasons for sickness absence are coded using a systematic coding framework based on the ICD10 system.
Analysis approach
The database was viewed from two perspectives:
- an incident database relating to absence spells, and
- an individual database relating to particular people in the sample.
Key findings
A major message from the data is that a range of important variables simultaneously influences the pattern of individual sickness absence. This suggests that stereotypes or generalisations sometimes made in relation to absence should be viewed with caution.
There are very clear differences in average working days lost per absence spell between the industries in the database, ranging from 3.28 days to 7.31 days. It is clear that the frequency of absence spells as well as the working days lost per absence spell must be considered along with the particular job demands and the management intervention policy, because they can all combine to influence the pattern observed.
Reasons for absence
More than 60% of all spells of absenteeism are accounted for by four reasons:
- gastrointestinal problem (20.4%)
- infection (16.4 %)
- non-medical factors (14.2%)
- musculoskeletal problem (10.8%)
These patterns again depend upon age, gender and nature of the industry.
In terms of total time lost due to absence, the top two causes are first, musculoskeletal problems and second, mental health problems, In the area of mental health the most prevalent reasons are stress and depression, and these account for some 50% of absence spells. The spells too can be lengthy, suggesting relatively high impact upon the organisation.
- The average spell of absence for a mental helath problem is 20.84 days
- The average spell of absence for stress is 21.48 days
- The average spell of absence for depression is 29.83 days.
The report highlights that the level of risk to the organisation of sickness absence depends upon the particular reason for absence and varies across organisations.
The results also indicate that the reasons for absenteeism tend to cluster along a dimension ranging from ‘medically verifiable’ to ‘self-diagnosed’. Typically, many short spells of absence are usually more disruptive to organisations, than the equivalent time lost as a single absence spell. The self-diagnosed absences may well contribute to these short, disruptive spells of absence and may merit further investigation.
Approaches to absence management
The report notes the limitations of some absence management methods currently in use, and suggests a method where the sickness absence patterns of an individual employee is compared with a reference group of similar individuals in a similar occupation. This means that questions such as whether an individual takes more or less time off than might be expected, or whether the patterns of absence are similar to genuine or non-genuine patterns previously identified, can be addressed.
Implications for HR practice
The report suggest that the potential to increase the value of management action in reducing the disruptive impact on organisational performance of employee sickness absence may be realised through the following strategies:
- Manage individual sickness absence cases through more specific and targeted practices based on case-sensitive data related to established norms for particular types of employees.
- Manage the underlying determinants of sickness absence through increased understanding of the causal factors leading to various patterns of non-attendance.
- Handle individual cases with far greater differentiation based on the recognition that the patterns of the sickness absence records of individual employees can be used to inform the appropriateness or effectiveness of any management intervention. Recommendations on how to develop the necessary data to facilitate the interventions of the HR professionals are included in the report.
SPURGEON, P., MAZELAN, P., BARWELL, F., FLANAGAN, H. (2007) New Directions in Managing Employee Absence: An evidence-based approach. ‘Research into Practice’ report. London:CIPD.