Simple policy tweak improves workers’ health, productivity
November 10, 2009 by Christian SchappelPosted in: Communication, Health care, Pay and benefits, Special Report - Benefits
Your company policies directly impact employees’ risk of heart disease, how much they sleep and their families’ well-being, eight separate studies have found.
Implementing flexible policies can add years to your employees’ lives, according to a three-year nationwide study released by the Work, Family and Health Network.
The following findings for the study were compiled by eight federally-funded research teams:
- Workers are twice as likely to develop cardiovascular disease if there is little willingness in the workplace to accommodate employees’ family needs — like caring for a sick child or attending one of their kids’ sporting events.
- People who work for companies that are flexible about where and when work is done get an average of 30 minutes more sleep per night.
- Employees who experienced tension in the office say they feel out of touch with their child’s activities.
Communicate flexibility
While many companies have added flex-time or telecommuting policies, close to 40% of employees believe they’d be less likely to advance at their company if they asked for flex schedules, found the study.
That means companies that want their employees to take advantage of flex policies need to assure workers these activities won’t put their job security or career goals at risk.
It pays to communicate that message, according to the study. Companies with a more flexible culture benefited from:
- less unnecessary work being done
- increased employee support for the organization, and
- a 45% reduction in employee turnover.
Tags: cardiovascular disease, flex-time, heart disease, turnover, Work Family and Health Network
November 12th, 2009 at 3:59 pm
Flex policies work if you are in a large company. As a manufacturer with less than 50 employees, flex time is not an option. In today’s economy, we can not afford to accommodate employees and meet our production needs. Turnover has never been an issue — average 5 employees a year, none in management or the office for 4 years and the one who did leave 4 years ago want to come back (the grass wasn’t greener) — so having it available has not been a “demand”. But, for the young, single parents, we do struggle accommodating them to meet the needs of their children (ie doctor’s appointments, school programs, athletics, etc.). Our attendance policy is a point based system that I have been told by the unemployment office is one of the “most generous” plans they have ever seen. Does anyone have a suggestion have a plan already for the “small companies”?
November 13th, 2009 at 9:36 am
Hi cj,
I am not sure if this would work in your line of business or not but what we do (we do have a flexible work schedule option) is if we are not provided with at least a week’s notice that an employee needs time off, we require that the employee finds someone to work their shift that day/night, however the manager needs to approve the replacement due to overtime and such. If they cant find anyone then they must work it. We do have a lot of “on Call, as needed” staff so if you don’t have that, it may not work. It’s never been a problem, employees have always found someone who will cover for them.
November 16th, 2009 at 12:23 pm
We allow hourly employees to take time off without penalty for doctor’s appointments or school activities, etc provided they make up the missed time within that week (and it has to be pre-arranged). If there is no extra work available for them, the missed time counts against their attendance. Most departments will work with them so they are usually able to make up the missed time. We are a small manufacturer (60 employees) and only run 1 shift.