Telecommunications
24x7 Absence Management Service
One of Australia’s largest internet service providers with more than 1.3 million customers as of 15 August 2011. The company is primarily focussed on ADSL-based Internet access, using their own ADSL2+ infrastructure, reselling Telstra ADSL services and more recently in reselling the NBN. The company also provides optical-fibre, dial-up, and voice services.
An aggressive acquisition strategy and the associated rapid increase in the number of employees was stressing infrastructure. The obvious lack of adequate organisational processes and structures was putting a squeeze on internal resources and elevating absenteeism rates way beyond tolerable levels. This led the company to engage with us in 2006 to design an absence management solution that was fit for purpose.
“We knew about their absence management service through industry word of mouth. Organisations were reporting absence reductions of between 20% and 45% year on year. I was keen to explore this idea further.” (GM Human Resources)
The Solution
With a workforce across the globe, the company needed high visibility of their workforce absenteeism performance. We worked directly with the Executive Team and HR to design a tailored solution which included:
- A consistent and fair processes for staff to report all absences, safely and securely
- Confidential medical advice to employees and their adult family members
- A custom suite of absence reports identifying causes, patterns, and hotspots (based on the company’s organisational hierarchy)
- A high-quality implementation plan to ensure the solution yields its intended outcomes
- A tiered training solution involving senior management through to frontline leaders
- Annual absence strategy bootcamps with senior leaders and HR to re-align absence reduction targets, and address capability gaps
- Ongoing skills development as part of the organisation’s new manager on-boarding program
Results
“It did not take long for the benefits of the program to be realised. In our first year alone, we achieved absence reductions of 27% and a reduction in our sick leave costs. Year on year we are getting results as high as 45% below pre-our partnership levels.” (GM Human Resources)
The absence management program allowed the client to monitor absence more efficiently, and to quickly identify where the real problems were. The organisation was able to then design targeted attendance optimisation strategies to address hotspot areas. All levels of management were taking greater levels of accountability, and there was marked shift in absence culture.