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Good practices in companies

FREMAP provides solutions to companies and makes available to them shared knowledge, where some practices and experiences expressed by the companies are related.

To this end, FREMAP conducts benchmarking sessions with companies from different sectors that are committed to managing absenteeism, seeking to improve the health of workers, and therefore, their productivity.

It is clear that more and more companies are concerned with offering their employees the best possible working and health conditions, because they understand that healthy employees are more motivated and more productive, and that is ultimately beneficial for the workers, for the company and consequently for the Social Security System.

  • Definition of a homogeneous Absenteeism Index across all organizations, allowing them to compare themselves with the sector they belong to and with companies from other sectors.
  • Measuring absenteeism throughout the company with a homogeneous absenteeism index, for each workplace, for each branch and for each department, in order to identify where absenteeism occurs in the company and the differences between each center/department. Once the workplaces with the highest absenteeism rates are identified, specific action plans are designed to analyse and reduce absenteeism, and workplaces with the lowest absenteeism rates are rewarded.
  • To delve deeper into the causes of absenteeism through diagnosis, rather than focusing solely on the effects. The company distinguishes the different types of absenteeism: medical absenteeism (occupational or non work-related injury or disease), non-medical absenteeism, manageable absenteeism, non-manageable absenteeism, foreseen absenteeism and unforeseen absenteeism. And within these causes, differentiate absenteeism by category: job, age, gender and type of contract.
  • An absenteeism rate target is set in each branch of the company and the absenteeism rates are officially and periodically communicated to the entire organization, promoting a horizontal message.
  • Each year, the company develops an Absenteeism Management Plan, which sets the objectives regarding the absenteeism rate, as well as the actions to be taken to achieve these rates following the continuous improvement management system. All employees share in the success achieved, and if the absenteeism rate is reduced with respect to the previous quarter, any savings in absenteeism costs are distributed among workers at the workplace.

  • Absenteeism should be considered a priority issue in the organization and all employees of the company must be involved: Management, HR management, medical services, health and safety services, middle management, workers' committees, and health and safety committees. This ensures that the entire company is aware of the importance of absenteeism for the company and makes it possible to stress absenteeism and its costs in the value chain.
  • A strategic plan is being developed aimed at reducing absenteeism in the company with the involvement of management and collaboration of the works council with two objectives: Zero accidents and a reduction in the absenteeism rate to below 3%.
  • A dashboard of absenteeism index targets aligned with company objectives is created for each area manager, and absenteeism is framed within the company's profit and loss account.
  • The EVOLUCIONA PLAN is implemented in the company, promoting absenteeism as a priority issue and encouraging greater intensity in the management of absenteeism.
  • The company promotes a cultural change through awareness and internal marketing to incorporate healthy habits. The slogan is: Thinking about YOUR Health and that of YOUR family. Once a year the company organises HEALTHY WEEK, a week used to promote healthy habits in terms of diet, anti-smoking campaigns, sports (like Bike to Work Day, one day a year on which employees bike to work).

  • A protocol is established for action in the event of a workplace accident: Direct communication by the employee to his/her immediate superior. Once the manager is notified that a work-related injury has occurred, he/she personally communicates all the information to the Health and Safety Service along with his/her opinion and subsequently goes with the employee to the FREMAP healthcare centre. The loss prevention officer goes to the site to investigate the work-related injury. All incidents are investigated, not only injuries.
  • Prevention in-itinere accidents through research, safety campaigns, company transport routes, and mandatory driving courses for commercial vehicles.
  • Training and information for workers to prevent accidents: So that all employees are aware of the injuries that occur at the company and can learn to avoid hazardous conduct. Newsletters are published to notify all employees every time an injury occurs at the company. Based on the injuries that occur, solutions are implemented across the board throughout the company. Health and safety at the company seeks "to do for people", not only comply with regulations.
  • Identification of the "near miss": This entails identifying unsafe work situations that may lead to a possible injury. Monthly departmental meetings are conducted where such information is used to attempt to prevent future injuries.
  • "Learn from our mistakes" campaign: It consists of observing unsafe conduct: The employees themselves observe what their co-workers do. They have a check-list of what not to do because it is hazardous conduct. Observation is done on a rotating basis among all employees.
  • "Avoid injuries" programme: Injuries that have occurred are analysed on a quarterly basis and employees who have suffered these injuries are provided practical training, for example, training on the handling of loads is given in the case of back injuries. If the worker suffers from the injury again, he/she also repeats the course.
  • Benchmarking among the prevention technicians of the group of companies itself, especially when the company is international, with regular meetings and with unification of criteria at the group level and benchmarking in safety with other external companies.

  • Continuous and annually planned training program for middle management, taking into account new hires and staff turnover, with special emphasis on absenteeism management: absences, follow-ups, active role of middle management, its knowledge of the direct and indirect costs of absenteeism, the economic impact on the organisation of medical leaves.
  • Involve middle managers in organizing the work of their own team: Middle management is involved in the hiring process and is therefore involved in absenteeism management. It is given absenteeism reduction goal.
  • An acceptable percentage of absenteeism is agreed upon with middle management, which implies not hiring substitutes (neither work accidents nor maternity are taken into account). It is about making middle management aware of the fact that it manages the absenteeism of its team.
  • Humanizing the relationship between middle management and employees, adopting a conciliatory approach, with the aim of fostering a more sensitive relationship between management and the people on their team: manage with people in mind, in addition to establishing a protocol followed by middle management to welcome workers rejoining the team after a medical leave, primarily after long-term absences. This seeks to prevent the "barrier to returning".
  • The role of middle management is key to disseminating good practices throughout the company from each workplace. Yearly meetings are conducted among supervisors to share and exchange experiences in managing absenteeism. There are also meetings, conferences and forums among middle management.

  • The company promotes the need to recover values. Not measuring absenteeism as something negative, it is necessary to measure work as something positive, measuring the worker when he/she is at work and not measuring his/her work when he/she is not. That is, to measure the productivity of employees by results in order to prevent short-term absenteeism, presenteeism and emotional absenteeism, thus motivating workers to develop their talent in the company.
  • Work-life balance and flexibility measures: Some examples of these measures are: Teleworking in those companies that can do it, the Work-Life Balance Plan, which allows for flexible working hours (1 hour entry and another exit); nursery schools onsite or semi-private, flexibility in reducing working hours and for nursing; flexibility for holidays; facilitate shift changes and leaves of absence to care for relatives.
  • Conducting surveys of employees with questions regarding how the company is operated, company policies and work atmosphere (an internal survey and a survey conducted by an external consulting firm) in order to learn the opinion of workers and prepare actions plans for each department to improve how the company is run. Examples of improvement: flexitimes, thematic months for employees (life is good when it's healthy), agreements with different companies for employees (nurseries, travel agencies, etc.).
  • Work with rotations in different departments and also with rotation in different jobs to prevent de-motivation in performing routine tasks and to motivate for career paths. Rotation is also used when problems of leadership or among co-workers are detected.
  • EFR Certificate: Family-Responsible Company. It is an initiative of Fundación Más Familia and certifies companies that develop policies making it possible for employees to reconcile personal life with family life.
  • Well-being plan, which consists of arranging to have a physiotherapist available every morning to employees with payment shared between the company and the employee at a minimum price and a psychology office available to employees with payment made entirely by the company.
  • Rewarding non-absenteeism. Some examples of this practice are: MINUTE A DAY (these are daily follow-up meetings between managers and their team members to assess absenteeism results and possible incentives or awards for improved results), Award of up to two non-recoverable days of leave per year (depending on whether individual absenteeism is below 0.5%), "Zero Accidents" Award (consisting of 3 days of free time).

  • The company does not prioritize zero absenteeism but uses compensation systems linked to productivity and workplace accident rates. This must be viewed by the entire company as a strategic issue and the absenteeism rate target must be similar in importance to the rest of the company's objectives.
  • Variable compensation system for all employees based on company and individual objectives. This means that there is teamwork to achieve these objectives.
  • The company has a premium that is ( A + B ) x C: where A is linked to productivity and B to versatility while C is the corrective factor which is the absenteeism rate of each worker.
  • Reduction of voluntary supplements to temporary disability benefits: For example in scale, thus the first leave in the year is complemented. If the employee has another leave within the same year, it is completed at 85%, while the third leave is not complemented at all. Chronic diseases are excluded.
  • Companies whose biggest cost of absenteeism is the indirect cost of training are working on versatility across different areas.
  • Incentives based on 5% - 10% of salary linked to sales and absenteeism. If the worker has more than three days of absenteeism for a Non Work-related injury or disease or for a Work-related injury in the year, he/she would not be paid the incentive (if preventive measures have not been used, the incentive is directly not paid).
  • If the absenteeism rate in the company falls below the level set by the company, a bonus is given to all workers. That is, if the company's entire staff achieves the absenteeism rate target set for the company, each employee will receive between 0 and 200 euros, provided that no individual worker has had more than two absences in the year. If the company's absenteeism rate is below the target set, a higher premium is paid.

  • Companies with different platforms nationwide with company management centralised from a single office that control absenteeism from a distance will prepare an action plan to decentralise management and appoint staff in human resources by Autonomous Community in order to better control absenteeism by province. This is how a decentralized human resources management system is implemented.
  • Creation in the human resources department with two job profiles: A person devoted to the administrative management of medical leaves in order to reduce the time it takes to transfer information to middle management in the HR department and to send leaves to FREMAP, and another person devoted to managing and monitoring leaves who reports on absenteeism to management on a daily basis.
  • The role of human resources manager is created. It is a person who has a close relationship with employees, who knows them, thus preventing the anonymity of the person on medical leave. He/she is also in charge of handling workers designated as especially sensitive.
  • The company sets itself the following objectives for addressing absenteeism: Supporting ill employees; detecting employees with recurrent short-term leaves, and lastly managing long-term leaves and subsequent returns to the workplace.
  • Involve all areas of the organization in managing absenteeism, creating committees that individually analyze the situation of each employee on sick leave, proposing specific actions, for example: position changes, payment of pending medical tests, inviting the worker to talk to the committee about his/her needs.
  • The company controls in-person absenteeism by distributing to all employees the code of good practices, which informs the worker of the prohibition of personal use of the company's computer equipment. Time spent on the Internet is evaluated every month.
  • The company tracks absenteeism in three ways:
  1. On a daily basis: First thing in the morning, management meets with middle management who reports on absences during the previous day.
  2. On a monthly basis: There is competition among factories to decrease absenteeism.
  3. Peaks in absenteeism: In the event of an increase in the absenteeism rate with respect to previous periods, a working group is formed to analyse the causes in the past year and the possible solutions.

  • The company implements absenteeism prevention with a long-term perspective through preventative medicine and early detection of potential health problems in workers. For example, through vaccination campaigns, campaigns to prevent serious diseases (prevention of glaucoma, osteoporosis), back schools, road safety campaigns, ergonomic training, and "Healthy Habits" campaigns.
  • Companies with their own medical services have a dual objective: on the one hand, to reduce absenteeism costs since workers request less leave to attend medical appointments, and on the other hand, the company achieves a social benefit for the worker who has a second medical opinion on their condition. It seeks to promote the overall health of the company.
  • The company's medical service monitors temporary disability processes during sick leave and subsequently after the workers' return to the company. The worker's agreement sets forth that an employee on medical leave must visit the company doctor once a week if the employee's medical problem allows him/her to do so.
  • The human resources department receives a daily report from the company doctor indicating, according to his medical criteria, whether or not the temporary incapacity of the worker on medical leave is warranted. This report also provides a month by month comparison of the temporary incapacity of each worker and the workers which have had leaves in previous months.
  • The workers have a social benefit, which is private health insurance. The company pays one part and the worker pays the other part.
  • Agreements with private clinics for rehabilitation, always prescribed by the company doctor, and in psychological pathologies, agreements are made with Mental Health Centers.
  • The company medical service analyzes and manages permanent disabilities, first identifying chronic pathologies and then providing all necessary resources from the company, such as medical reports, reviews by medical experts, etc. to support and collaborate with the worker suffering from the disease in order to apply for permanent disability with the National Social Security Institute's Provincial Office.