Resilience and presenteeism

Introduction

Resilience is the ability to sustain determination to successfully complete a task or achieve a long term goal. It, also, relates to inner strength that enables individuals to ‘bounce back’ to their normal self in the face of adverse events.

Organisational resilience has similar features – the determination to achieve a goal, and the ability to respond effectively to internal and external pressures for change – the most obvious being, these days, adjusting to the economic pressures.

Presenteeism is the phenomenon that is employees and managers turning up for work but under performing either due to feeling unwell or fear of losing a job. Presenteeism causes massive under performance, yet is hardly addressed by business and services.

The costs of presenteeism

According to research the costs of people coming to work and under performing represents about 58% of the costs relating to psychological distress at work – the remaining costs being associated with sickness absence and staff turnover.

Build resilience against presenteeism

In order to overcome the losses caused by threats to wellbeing and the existence of presenteeism, a programme of Building and Sustaining Resilience at Work is suggested.

Step 1 – use the Health and Wellbeing Questionnaire to establish the level of presenteeism in your business or service.

Step 2 – Establish a training and awareness programme in resilience for your managers and employees.

Step 3 – implement methods of measuring levels of presenteeism.

Step 4 – measure the impact of the training and awareness programmes on levels of presenteeism.

Step 5 – identify managers who need coaching in the behaviours that build resilience amongst staff, and then embark on a coaching programme for these managers.

Resilience training

Call us on 0844 332 0143 or email us to discover how our resilience training programme can help your managers and workforce develop resilience against stress and other adverse events at work and at home.