Is "presenteeism" (sick workers) a problem at your job?

In My Humble Opinion
1

Article in the print edition of the NY Times Science Section today defines “presenteeism”
as when sick workers feel compelled to come to work anyway, and thus end up passing
their germs onto their colleagues. In a lot of cases they are afraid of losing their jobs,
and their fears may not be unfounded, as if you are over your alloted number of sick
days per year you could get reprimanded or even canned.

Me despite working with kids all day I never get sick, but I do occasionally see some
coworkers walking in with the sniffles and such. Do you have this happen at your
workplace? And if so what was the worst case of sick coworker you ever saw?

2

I go into work sick all the time, and so does everyone else. I’ll stay home if I’m sick enough that actually getting to work and sitting at my desk all day will be problematic.

People may complain about others spreading their germs around the office, but at the end of the year, management counts up your sick days, and you don’t get congratulated for keeping your germs at home.

3

One of the ladies I work with is a “close talker” and it seems that she’s always sick, too. She constantly does things like use my phone, or cough when she’s leaning over my shoulder. I’m too tough to be taken down by her wimpy germs but it still pisses me off, especially since she has no qualms about taking time off for things like having her hair done.

4

We’re a really small company – total of 7 full-time and one part-time employees, including the owner and his wife. If one person’s out, it’s inconvenient. If two are out, we’re hurting. So there’s a lot of incentive to not be out.

However, the sales person (who is an idiot and is AFAIK getting fired soon) came in sick as a dog couple of weeks ago, and all of us have been sick since. It’s not just that he came in sick, he is not careful about personal health issues. I mean, if there’s a plate of Christmas cookies out for all to share, do NOT cough on them. Do NOT handle them all with your (probably unwashed) hands. Cover your frickin’ mouth with a handkerchief or tissue when you cough or sneeze, dagnabbit. Arrrgggh!

5

I called out sick today–I’m on what I believe to be the last day of a nasty cold, and I expect to be able to come in to work tomorrow; this’ll be the first day I’ve missed, BTW–and now I have to wait at urgent care, probably through the night, to get a doctor’s note. What I really need is sleep at home, IMO, but apparently at work they’d rather I handle peoples’ sandwiches with a virus. I doubt I could take another day off without a terminal diagnosis. Thankfully I got a generous monetary gift from a friend recently, or else I wouldn’t be able to afford to take today off, either.

6

Sick days = vacation days at my place of work, so every day we’re out sick is one less vacation day. So yeah, everybody comes in when they are sick.

7

I saw it more in my old job than I do at my new job. Heck, at my new job people take off if they were up too late watching a movie.

But at the old job it seemed like there were a lot of people who would come in sick and get us all sick.

8

We have the occasional “presenteeism” in our office. The germ issue isn’t so much of a problem with our offcie set-up, but “presenteeism” also refers to the lack of productivity of employees who are there but incapable of getting work done. That messes us up more.

If you aren’t there, we can redistribute the work to compensate. But if you’re there and we have to assign you the work, but you can’t do it… it messes things up for the rest of us. Go home.

9

Actually, my workplace is pretty good about this. We don’t need doctor’s notes or anything, and sick days are seperate from vacation days. They don’t really ask for an explanation, either, they trust you. If you’re part time, however, and you miss too much you have to quit.

10

I did it last week. :frowning:

I just started this job a few weeks ago, so I have no real leave yet, and I had a nasty cold last week – I’m still recovering from it. I did have 3 hours of sick leave already, which I used, but mostly I was here, spreading my horrible germy germs. I was as careful as I could be (frequently washing my hands, covering my mouth when I coughed, etc.), but when I came in this morning I heard the woman across from me coughing. I apologized to her, and she laughed (which made her cough again … I’m a monster!). It was especially frustrating because work was very slow last week, and it would have been great timing to stay home for a day or two.

I don’t get sick very often, and I don’t remember the last time I had anything worse than a cold (knock on wood!), but when I do get sick – and I have enough leave – I’ll usually stay home for at least a day. I do feel bad about bringing my germs in, plus a day of sleeping in and being one with the couch usually does help me feel better faster. If I could have taken 2 days off last week I’d probably be much better today instead of just a little better.

11

Best job I ever had in terms of sick leave policy was a health-related philanthropy, run by doctors and retired doctors. The sick leave policy was, “If you’re sick, stay home until you are well. If your children are sick, stay home with them until they are well.” They did not want hacking, sneezing virus-shedders on the premises, nor did they want parents who were spending half the work day calling home to check on little Susie or Johnnie. I’m sure that if anyone had abused this policy, they would have been asked to reconsider whether they were healthy enough to engage in full-time employment, but I don’t seem to recall that ever happening.

12

At my last full-time job, it was common to come to work with colds, but that’s it. When things got serious – pneumonia, bronchitis, strep, etc. – people stayed home.

Some salaried employees were quite paranoid about staying home sick, and even about taking vacation. I guess they didn’t want anyone to know that the company could survive without them.

“Sheila’s been out sick for a week. I wonder how she’s doing.”

“Really? I hadn’t noticed. What does she do anyway?”

13

Is this a management issue or an employee issue? Why don’t managers simply say, “You’re sick, go home!” or even (gasp) plan for sickness? Here in England, people get 23 days holiday, plus 7-8 statutory days holiday (which must be taken another time). Add in an Expectation of a few days sick, perhaps a week’s training, add a week as a per-employee average emergency for bereavements, jury service, etc. Realise that there are 250 working days in the year and you’ve just covered 50 days, so in any team of 5 people, you can expect that one person is going to be off at any one time. Therefore you should plan for it.

14

[QUOTE=Quartz]
Is this a management issue or an employee issue? Why don’t managers simply say, “You’re sick, go home!” or even (gasp) plan for sickness?
[/QUOTE]
If you look miserable enough, in my office your boss will tell you to go home. But we only get 3 sick days a year. Beyond that you either have to use up your holiday time or take unpaid leave. If you get really sick with a fever, chances are you’ll use up those three days all in one go!

So most people don’t use their sick days unless they feel really terrible because they might need them later in the event of more serious illness or injury.

If your absence is going to be a week or more, you need a doctor’s note. At a certain point they’ll ask you to go on disability leave. (At that point I would fear for my job.)

15

Quartz, I expect that the vast majority of US employers don’t have anything near that generous for time off.

16

[QUOTE=Ferret Herder]
Quartz, I expect that the vast majority of US employers don’t have anything near that generous for time off.
[/QUOTE]

The principle’s the same: you have X days holiday per your contract of employment, you have Y days statutory holiday, etc. The figure mayend up as one in six or seven or whatever, but that still means that management should have sufficient staff to cope with it.

17

[QUOTE=Quartz]
The principle’s the same: you have X days holiday per your contract of employment, you have Y days statutory holiday, etc. The figure mayend up as one in six or seven or whatever, but that still means that management should have sufficient staff to cope with it.
[/QUOTE]

That’s a lovely idea in theory. I wish it were reality. In my very small, specialized division, we were overworked with 3 workers. One gave notice, and the supervisors didn’t even start looking for a replacement until about a month after that person left. So with just my coworker and I, I certainly did go in to work while suffering from an intestinal issue (I suspect food poisoning) after taking only one day off. It didn’t match the symptoms of the currently-going-around contagious digestive ailment (Norovirus outbreak) at my workplace so I followed good hygenic practices just in case and worked while miserable.

18

Even if you have sick days, some companies will deduct points from your annual employee evaluation score for every sick day that you use.

19

[QUOTE=Quartz]
Is this a management issue or an employee issue? Why don’t managers simply say, “You’re sick, go home!” or even (gasp) plan for sickness? Here in England, people get 23 days holiday, plus 7-8 statutory days holiday (which must be taken another time). Add in an Expectation of a few days sick, perhaps a week’s training, add a week as a per-employee average emergency for bereavements, jury service, etc. Realise that there are 250 working days in the year and you’ve just covered 50 days, so in any team of 5 people, you can expect that one person is going to be off at any one time. Therefore you should plan for it.
[/QUOTE]

I am sure it was replied to before I got here BUT -

I think most of us are from the US.

FIrstly, we get IIRC 8 ‘federal holidays’ [christmas, new years, easter, memorial day, 4th of july, labor day and thanksgiving and some other day I cant remember.]

Secondly, in general we get 2 weeks vacation the first full year we are employed with the company, and if we work a partial year it gets prorated. I worked a partial year so I got a total of 7 days that are a combination of vacation and sick days. Starting Jan 1st, I will get 2 weeks of vacation/sick days.

Thirdly, unless we are ill for more than a certain amount of days most of us have to burn ‘vacation’ days as they are really combined vacation/sick days. If we are going to be out of work for more than IIRC 3 weeks we can go on short term disability. Frex if I go in for carpal tunnel surgery on a wrist, I get off work and onto short term disability for 6 weeks [Ill have to ask mrAru, he is a short term disability case manager for MetLife] If you are going to be out of work for longer than IIRC 6 months it gets turned into long term disability. Theoretically they can not fire you if you are out on disability. Many companies will find a way to squirm you out of your job and place you in a different lesser job when you come back so to subtlely make you quit.

Once we have worked for a company a number of years [it varies] we get another week of vacation days. In my company at the 5th year I get an additional week. I have worked for a company that it was 10 years before you got the 3d week. Many people run through jobs fast enough that they never get the third week of vacation. I know a lot of people who seem to have about a 3 year job cycle.

20

Like about half the workers in the US, I get no sick days. We accrue one vacation/sick day per month we work, and if you’re out sick, there goes a vacation day (and there’s a whole extra day’s work piled up on my desk that it will take me about two weeks to catch up on).

I don’t use my vacation days for “vacations,” either, I use them for “Mom emergencies.” I know I will have to go dashing off to Phila. to take care of her when she has a health crisis. I haven’t had an actual “get away by yourself and relax” vacation since the summer of 2001.

So, yeah, I (like everyone else in my office) come in sick, unless I am actually too sick to crawl to the door.