How best practice system usage can help management of unplanned absence

My favourite statistic at the moment illustrates the bottom line benefit from good HR management…

The CIPD Absence Management report 2015 identifies the average number of days lost through absence per year per employee across all sectors as a mean 8.3 days with a median cost of £554.

So …. if you can reduce that by half a day per employee for an organisation of 5,000 employees you can save £167,000 a year.

Let that sink in. £167,000 a year. For a half day reduction in absence!

Managing Unplanned Absence

So how can you go about reducing absence, by half a day? If it was that easy everyone would be doing it surely?

Management of unplanned absence – long and short term sickness, for example – can both reduce the incidence and duration of absence, however it is often said that “you can’t manage what you can’t measure”…

This is where system usage comes in…I am currently implementing a second phase of an Applaud HR Self Service project – adding mobile, tablet and desktop absence management to the existing person, assignment and hierarchy functionality.

Applaud sits on top of an existing Oracle HCM EBS implementation and allows absence data to be captured and viewed through an engaging and straightforward user interface. Any absence captured through Applaud will be interfaced to core Oracle HCM and, if you use Oracle payroll, the correct statutory and occupational payments and deductions calculated.

Enabling good HR Management

Common approaches to managing short term absence, taken from the CIPD Absence Management 2015 report, which are being enabled by the implementation include:

• Return to work interviews. We are enabling managers and employees to complete these online through desktops, tablets or mobiles and view them for follow up actions
• Trigger mechanisms to review attendance – accurate data recording allows alerts and reports to be developed to identify hotspots and triggers
• Sickness absence information is given to line managers in an easy to use format available through mobile, tablet and desktop. This includes both absence details, absence summaries, and an absence calendar to provide an “at a glance” view of team availability
• Line managers receive approval requests for absence through desktop, tablet or mobile and take primary responsibility for absence management

The most effective absence management requires a combination of organisation culture, absence policies and processes, data capture and data analysis to be aligned. Systems alone will not bring about the change, however a system that allows managers and employees to easily follow the organisation processes and policies is a key enabler to effective absence management.

For more information about Applaud and to see some further testimonials visit: Oracle HCM and Human Resources.