LABOUR ABSEENTISM
Introduction Absenteeism is a serious workplace problem and an expensive occurrence for both employers and employees seemingly unpredictable in nature. A satisfactory level of attendance by employees at work is necessary to allow the achievement of objectives and targets by a department. Employee Absenteeism is the absence of an employee from work. It is a major problem faced by almost all employers of today. Employees are absent from work and thus the work suffers. Absenteeism of employees from work leads to back logs, piling of work and thus work delay. Absenteeism is of two types : A) Innocent absenteeism Is one in which the employee is absent from work due to genuine cause or reason. It ma y be due to his illness or personal family problem or any other real reason2. B) Culpable Absenteeism I s o n e i n w h i c h a p e r s o n i s a b s e n t f r o m w o r k without any genuine reason or cause. He may be pretending to be ill or just wanted a holiday and stay at home. Many employees will, on occasions, need a few days off work because of illness, however, when absences become more frequent or long term and reach a n unacceptable level, action by management is necessary.
Absence from work can be expensive in both monetary and human terms. The costs incurred when an employee is absent from work may include Replacing the employee or requiring other staff to cover the absence; Inability to provide services, or achieve section and departmental objectives; Low morale and general dissatisfaction from other staff, particularly if the absence is perceived as unwarranted Definitions of Absenteeism 1) Absents constitutes a single day of missed work. 2) Absence occurs whenever a person chooses to allocate time to activities that compete with scheduled work. 3) An individual lack of physical presence at a given location and time when there is a social expectation for him or her to be there. 4) Absenteeism refers to Non?attendance of employee for scheduled work. 5) Absent is defined as failure of an employee to report to work when he or she is scheduled to do so. Effects Of Absenteeism Following are the drawbacks of excessive absenteeism 1) ON INDUSTRY Absenteeism in industry stops machines, disrupts processes, creates production bottle?necks, hampers smooth flow or continuity of work, upsets production targets, result in production losses, inc rea ses direct overhea d costs , inc rea se w o rk load of the
inexperienced , less experienced or sub standard workers as substitutes, this in turn creating problems of recruitment, training, job adjustments, morale and attitudes of the employees. 2) ON WORKERS a) A b s e n t e e i s m r e d u c e s w o r k e r s e a r n i n g s a n d a d d s t o h i s i n d e b t e d n e s s , d e c r e a s e h i s purchasing power. Makes it difficult for him to meet necessities of life, leading to personal problems, and in many cases loss of employment and resultant disaster for his dependents. b) It affects both quantity and quality of production. If more number of workers are absent the total output is affected. If alternative arrangement is made by employing casual workers w ho do not posses adequate experience the quality of goods produced is affected. c) It affects the efficiency of workers. The workers who joins after a long period of absence would normally be much less efficient. d) It affects the discipline of the workers adversely. The worker who is attending to his work irregularly may not care much about the discipline. Peculiar Features of absenteeism On the basis of micro studies undertaken in different parts of the country, certain observations may be made.
i)
The rate of absenteeism is the lowest on pay day, it increases considerably on the days following the payments of wages and bonus.
ii)
Absenteeism is generally high among workers below 15 years of age and those above40.The younger employees are not regular and punctual, presumably because of the employment of a large number of newcomers among the younger age groups. While the older people are not able to withstand the strenuous nature of the work.
iii)
The rate of absenteeism varies from department to department within a unit. As the size of the group increases, the rate of absenteeism goes up. This difference in the rate of absenteeism is believed to be due to the peculiar style and practices of management, the composition of the labour force and the culture of the organization.
iv)
The percentage of absenteeism is generally higher in the day shifts.
v)
The percentage of absenteeism is much higher in coal mining industries than in organized industries.
vi) vii)
Absenteeism in India is seasonal in character. It is the highest during March?April?may, when a land has to be prepared for monsoon saving, and also in the harvest season, when the rate goes as high as 40 percent.
TYPE OF RESEARCH DESCRIPTIVE RESEARCH The study follows descriptive research method. Descriptive studies aims at portraying accurately the characteristics of a particular group or situation. Descriptive research is concerned with describing the characteristics of a particular individual or a group. Here the researcher attempts to present the existing facts by collecting data. RESEARCH DESIGN A research design is a basis of framework, which provides guidelines for the rest of research process. It is the map of blueprint according to which, the research is to be conducted. The research design specifies the method of study. Research design is prepared after formulating the research problem. SOURCES OF DATA Data are the raw materials in which marketing research works. The task of data collection begins after research problem has been defined and research design chalked out. Data collected are classified into primary data and secondary data PRIMARY DATA Questionnaires were used for collecting primary data.
SECONDARY DATA Secondary data were collected from the company’s annual publications, memorandums of settlements, newspapers, journals, websites, and from library books. SAMPLING METHOD Sampling technique used in this study is ‘Random sampling’. The selected sample size is 60. SAMPLE SIZE The sample size taken for this study is 60. TOOLS FOR ANALYSIS Percentage analysis is used QUESTIONNAIRE Q.1) Age Parameters No. of Respondents Percentage 20?30 30?40 40?50 More than 50 Total 9 18 18 15 60 15 30 30 25 100
100 80 60 40 20 0 No. of Percentage Respondents 20?30 30?40 40?50 More than 50 Total
INFERENCE : It has been inferred that 30% of the employees who participated in the survey are of age group between 30?40 , 30% again come under the category between 40?50 age group and the rest of them belong to more than 50 (25%) and 20? 30(15%) types. Q.2) Sex Parameters No. of Respondents Percentage Male Female Total
100 80 60 40 20 0 No. of Respondents Percentage Male Female Total
42 18 60
70 30 100
INFERENCE: It has been inferred that 70% of the employees participated in the survey are male and the remaining come under the female category.
Q.3) Marital Status Parameters No. of Respondents Percentage Single Married Divorced Separated Widow Total
100 80 60 40 20 0 No. of Respondents Percentage Single Married Divorced Separated Widow Total
9 42 3 0 6 60
15 70 5 0 10 100
INFERENCE : It has been inferred that 70% of the employees who participated in the survey are married and 15% of respondents are bachelors. Rest of them are categorized under the category of widow and divorce cases.
Q.4) Employee able to communicate their feelings for others Parameters No. of Respondents Percentage Always Very often Often Rarely Never Total
100 80 60 40 20 0 No. of Respondents Percentage Always Very often Often Rarely Never Total
6 15 20 10 9 60
10 25 33.33 16.67 15 100
INFERENCE : It has been inferred that 33% of employees have an opinion that they can communicate their feelings to others often, 25% feels it very often. Also we can infer that 17% of the employees’ rate it as rarely and 15% of them never had any such feelings, but 10% of them feel always free enough to communicate with others. Q.5) Employees ? forthright, frank and willingness to stand up for his rights. Parameters No. of Respondents Percentage Always Frequently
12 27
20 45
Occasionally Rarely Never Total
100 80 60 40 20 0 No. of Percentage Respondents
13 5 3 60
21.67 8.33 5 100
Always Frequently Occasionally Rarely Never Total
FINDINGS On analysing the response it is found that, 35% of the employees are dissatisfied with their work. 50% of the employees have an opinion that stress is part of their work life. 43% agree and 27% strongly agree that their work is heavy. From this, it can be interpreted that the employees are having a hectic work schedule. A total of 70% of the employees feel lonely while working with others. 39% of workers feel bored in their routine work. 42% don’t have time for their personal activities. 40% of the workers are not satisfied with the welfare measures adopted by the company. Health problems seem to be one of the causes of absenteeism for the work. It is also found that 35% of the employees are satisfied with working condition.
It has been found that 40% of the respondents have an opinion that politics have no impact on the employee absenteeism. 60% of the employees feel that their colleagues did not help them in case of personal problems. CONCLUSION To conclude, employees’ dissatisfaction towards job & welfare measures, hectic work schedule, stress, health problems are some of the major causes of absenteeism. This can be reduced by the management by implementing various employee satisfactory changes in the organization. People are the major assets of any organization and taking care of their welfare and satisfaction is their duty as a whole apart from earning profit. As work environment is becoming more challenging and complex, the management must also see through it that, it is capable of managing and bringing in changes at the same pace so as to survive in this competitive scenario.
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