Attendance policies are always a tough subject. From the business perspective, the company pays the employee to show up to work and gives them an allotted amount of days off for unscheduled absences. From the employee's perspective, there could be many reasons why absences occur. There is the occassional unforeseen illness, there is the age old" I could not get the day off, so I am calling in sick or I don't like my job and I am calling in, and the reasons go on and on. There has been a lot of discussion around the reasons employees call in. What I haven't seen yet is the fact that some employees call in because they can't work the schedule they are assigned but need the job so they accept the job. I recently came across a case where an employee was about to be terminated for his attendance issues. He was a good employee (high quality and performance statistics) but had a personal family issue that required he take off on Saturday mornings.
I am sure that this and like scenarios occur in many call centers. Perhaps a way to address issues of these types is through the scheduling practices. It is very difficult to balance the business, customer and employee needs.
There are ways to accommodate all without being unfair, overly rigid or risking the business, thus resulting in a win-win for all.
If you are interested in some suggestions, feel free to contact me directly at
tteamer@callcpm.com.
Tracy Teamer