Employers are looking for ways to keep their employees healthy and at work. They don’t like seeing the sick leave hours being used because this means they have to pay the employee even though they didn’t produce anything for the company. With the economy struggling, employers are finding that sick leave and other benefits are the first things to get cut. If employers can’t offer sick leave to their employees, they will wind-up with sick employees all the time. If a sick employee comes to work, they will simply infect their co-workers with their cold and before you know it, you are losing just as much money because of all the sick employees.
If you can afford to offer sick leave to your employees, do it. Set some harsh rules about sick leave so that people don’t abuse it. Hopefully you don’t need to check-up on your employees and ask for a doctor’s note to prove that they really are sick. Simply set a level of respect and trust in your office so your employees know they have to be sick to use the sick leave. It is much easier to pay one employee to stay home and use sick leave than to have 6 employees staying home and losing all that money on production costs.
If you can’t offer sick leave benefits to your employees, can you offer other incentives? How about the option to work from home? Although your employee may be sick, they may still be able to perform some of their job duties. If you trust your employees, you may want to consider letting some of them work from home to make-up for the lost time and lost money in production costs.
Extended hours are another great alternative to sick leave. If you can have extra hours for “make-up” time available for your employees, you won’t lose money in production costs and the employee won’t lose money on their income. Try opening up a Saturday for the employees that need to make-up hours or opening early or staying late. Find a way to work with your employees where you can both benefit.
It is important to hire a good cleaning crew to sterilize your office often. If you can’t hire a cleaning crew, make your employees responsible for cleaning. Give each one of them disinfectant wipes and hand sanitizer that they must keep on their desk. At the end of each work day, require the employees to sanitize their desks, telephones, computer, keyboard, and mouse. If your employees eat at their desks, make them sanitize after they have eaten and make sure they properly clean their keyboard with an aerosol can.
Make sure the areas that are frequently used are cleaned daily. Everyone always thinks about the germs on the bathroom doorknob, but what about the germs on the door to your office? Has that ever been sterilized? Have you thought about all the people that have touched that door? When you disinfect, be sure to give all the doorknobs, filing cabinets, printers, copy machines, light switches, and common areas a good scrub.
Another way to prevent employees from getting sick in the first place is to have a healthy office. Encourage your employees to exercise each day. Pay extra attention to the employees that need to quit smoking or need to lose some weight. These employees tend to be in the higher risk pool for insurance companies so you really want to help them lose the weight or give up smoking to see your company’s health insurance costs decrease. Give your employees an extra 15-20 minutes each day so they can exercise. Encourage them to take a brisk walk during their lunch hour or to do something physical that will get their blood flowing.