MANAGING ATTENDANCE

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MANAGING ATTENDANCE

• The Wellbeing_at_Work Perspective

Jason Drake Policy Officer, Acting Deputy Manager
(Health, Safety Wellbeing)
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THE DEAL!
Greer Bailey Manager for Health, Safety
Wellbeing.. Attends Corporate Management
Board in late 2005 and says Give me 140K and
Ill save you 1M 10 of sickness absence costs
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Where We Were

• ISOLATED.
• SEEN AS UNHELPFUL.
• THE POLICE FORCE.
• A BARRIER.
• UNTIMELY.
• BUREACRATIC.

TO NEGATIVE A VIEW..?
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Doing The Deal!

• INITIATIVES INTRODUCED
• TRAINING.
• DATA.
• TARGETED INTERVENTIONS.
• REHABILITATION.
• POLICIES.
• STRUCTURE.
• ACTIVITIES.
• CHANGING THE REFERRAL PROCESS

AIM To develop consistent, timely,
collaborative robust interventions
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STRUCTURE

• OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH ADVISERS
• NURSES
• SECRETARIES AND ADMINISTRATIVE SUPPORT
• REFERRAL CO-ORDINATOR
• OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH PHYSICIANS
• BUSINESS SUPPORT MANAGER
• COUNSELLORS
• HEALTH PROMOTION AND STRESS INTERVENTION
  CO-ORDINATOR
• POLICY OFFICER
• EMPLOYEE RELATIONS ADVISERS
• INFORMATION CO-ORDINATOR

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WELLBEING_at_WORK SERVICES

• Telephone advice guidance.
• OHA/P Appointments for advice recommendations
  on sickness absence.
• Advice regarding retirement for reasons of
  ill-health.
• OHA/N visit to the workplace to advise on
  workplace ergonomics the work environment.
• Ergonomic tuition.
• To perform statutory medicals.
• Solution focused interventions (e.g. single
  session problem solving).
• Brief management intervention.
• One to one counselling, either on-line, by phone
  or in person.
• Post trauma interventions.
• Coaching.
• Planned physiotherapy.
• Medico-legal advice.
• Health promotion.

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TRAINING ALL APPRAISAL MANAGERS

• This is a compulsory training event to raise
  awareness of the managers role and the tools
  available to help them effectively manage their
  sickness absence. It includes
• ONE DAYS TRAINING
• POLICIES.
• DDA.
• PROCESSES.
• SUPPORT (Employee Relations, Wellbeing_at_Work,
  HS, Unions).
• ROLE PLAY CASE STUDIES.
• COMMUNICATION(!)
• STAFF PERSPECTIVE.
• CHANGING CULTURE.
• REHABILITATION.
• DIRECT REFERRALS NOW.

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DATA

• BVPI (14).
• UNRELIABLE.
• HOTSPOTS.
• INFORMATION CO-ORDINATOR ROLE.

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TARGETED INTERVENTIONS (HOTSPOTS)

• WHY WHAT ARE THE ISSUES?
• COLLABORATIVE APPROACH.
• RAPID REFERRALS.
• NAMED NURSE.
• COUNSELLING.
• HEALTH EDUCATION INITIATIVES.
• HEALTH NEEDS ASSESSMENT.
• STRESS POLICY IMPLEMENTATION.
• WESTFIELD.
• MSDs BACK-TO-WORK PROGRAMME.
• CASE CONFERENCING.
• PAYING FOR SURGERY?

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REHABILITATION

• POLICY.
• BIOPSYCHOSOCIAL APPROACH.
• TIMESCALES.
• EXCEPTIONS TO THE RULE.
• ADVICE ONLY.
• CASE CONFERENCE.
• MYTHS.

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WHY CHANGE THE REFERRAL PROCESS?

• Managers to have direct contact with W_at_W for
  referrals.
• To speed up the process.
• To improve the quality of information.
• Improve employee participation.
• Improve health performance at work.
• Fits with new Vocational Rehabilitation policy

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SO HOW ARE WE DOING?
Managing Absence Data We thought we had a large
number of long term (28 days) absences which
were not being managed within DCC but a lot of
this was due to poor data. Once we cleaned up the
data the picture looked a lot better. For
example In January 07 for non-schools DCC
long term absences
We thought from an initial look at the data our
oldest open absence was from 19/3/04 in fact the
oldest real absence with no OH intervention was a
couple of months - the vast majority of long term
absences refer to Wellbeing_at_Work sooner or later.
Out of 9663 non-schools DCC employments (not
FTEs) this represents a long term absence rate of
2.0 Source ARM/Payroll Long Term Absence
snapshot extract mid Jan 07
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SO HOW ARE WE DOING?
Reasons for Absence
01/01/06 31/12/06
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SO HOW ARE WE DOING?
Referrals to W_at_W (OH) are up 37 comparing Oct 06
Feb 07 to same period last year. Case Study
X Unit Absences - Comparison at end of 05 and
end 06 end 05 end 06 Number of absences
17 11 Number of LTA 7 7 Lost hours for LTA
6011.35 1606.0 Top reasons 3309.5
MSD 1226.5 MSD 2331.1 psyc 176.75
surgical 137.75 heart 128.0
psyc Employees 78 65 The figures for this
unit are two snapshots of the month of December
for comparison purposes. They do not reflect
ongoing absence levels, and will be subject to
all the normal weaknesses of ARM data. Source
X Unit Absences (sheet comparison) (in MAP
folder)
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LOOKING FORWARD

• ADJUSTED TIMESCALE 3 YEAR PLAN.
• DATA ISSUES KPIS.
• MSD INITIATIVE.
• REPORTING TO CMB.
• CONTINUE TO TARGET.
• OTHER INITIATIVES

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THANK YOU ANY QUESTIONS?