Reply to Addressing Absenteeism In The Workplace Discussion 1

Reply to Addressing Absenteeism In The Workplace Discussion 1

Q – Please read the discussion below and prepare a Reply to this discussion post with comments that further and advance the discussion topic.

Discussion

Addressing Absenteeism In The Workplace

           Organizations continuously identify, measure, and develop the performance of their employees to align with their objectives and vision in a process called performance management (Aguinis, 2023). In performance management, organizations identify incidences of excellent or poor employee performance. In my previous workplace, I observed a situation where most employees were either absent or late for work. Absenteeism had become a serious problem in this organization to the point that half of the employees in every department were absent at least twice a week. Even those who came to work were also getting late on some days. I was also absent from work at least twice a month because it had become a habit. I realized that employees missed work because they were demotivated. The pay was relatively low, and the management did not reward employees based on their performance. I consider this an example of common poor employee performace.

           Managers can address absenteeism problems like the one witnessed in my previous workplace by introducing performance management strategies. One of the strategies is to monitor employees’ behaviors. This behavioral approach focuses on how employees do the job (Aguinis, 2023). When the managers monitor how employees work, they will be able to identify the pattern of absenteeism or lateness. Then, they can discipline or reprimand the absent employees to discourage this poor workplace behavior. Employees who understand that they will be punished for unjustified absenteeism will rarely be absent from work (Gupta, 2020). The other strategy is to measure employee performance results and compare them with the set targets. This result-based performance management strategy focuses on what employees produce (Aguinis, 2023). The managers understand that absenteeism leads to underperformance because employees spend less time working than anticipated. Therefore, results will indicate whether the employees are performing as expected. When they monitor and measure the outcomes of what employees do, they will identify the poor-performing employees and take the appropriate action. These two performance management strategies are meant to measure how and what employees do and then take corrective measures.

           In performance management, managers use different tools and models to measure the success of their approaches. In this case, after implementing the two strategies to solve absenteeism in the organization, managers need to evaluate their success by checking the key performance indicators (KPIs) and performance standards. KPIs indicate how well the employees perform in relation to the organization’s strategic goals and vision (Domínguez et al., 2019). Then, performance standards will show how well the employees have achieved the objectives set by the organization. The other tool that I would use to determine the success or failure of the recommended strategies would be Artificial Intelligence systems. AI is now an integral part of performance management, and it would help identify performance trends (Khaled et al., 2022). AI would help track and keep records of employee attendance and performance automatically. Once I employ these tools and models, I would know whether the recommended strategies for solving absenteeism problem have succeeded or failed.

References

Aguinis, H. (2023). Performance management. Chicago Business Press.

Domínguez, E., Pérez, B., Rubio, Á. L., & Zapata, M. A. (2019). A taxonomy for key performance indicators management. Computer Standards & Interfaces, 64, 24-40.

Gupta, R. (2020). Impact of Absenteeism on Employee Productivity with Special Reference to Manufacturing Companies of Nagpur Region. Our Heritage, 68(1).

Khaled, A. S., Sharma, D. K., Yashwanth, T., Reddy, V. M. K., doewes, R. I., & Naved, M. (2022, June). Evaluating the Role of Robotics, Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence in the Field of Performance Management. In Proceedings of Second International Conference in Mechanical and Energy Technology: ICMET 2021, India (pp. 285-293). Singapore: Springer Nature Singapore.