See you in 3 and a bit weeks

Is treating everybody equally the same as treating people fairly?

Imagine if you will, an employer with incredibly slack absence management policies, do you think people would abuse this system? Of course they would. They'll take sick days rather than holiday, they'll take 2 days when they only really needed one...heck some will take a year off on full pay...but that's another story

Obviously an organisation can't continue with a system that is being abused so the sensible thing would be to bring in a new system that doesn't penalise the innocent, but at the same time brings the less honest individuals into line

Unfortunately the 'imaginary' organisation of which I speak have gone one step further, favouring the 'treat everyone like a serial offender so we can't be accused of victimisation'

No one can argue now that everyone isn't being treated equally, but instead of harsher treatment on the worst people, it's harsh treatment all around

Now imagine if you will that you work for said company, and you've had 6 days sickness in over 12 months, half of which was a virus spread around where you work because people were afraid to take time off. How would you expect to be treated, I mean, it's only 6 days, some people will take that off in a week. But oh no, we have to be fair, and it's got nothing to do with trying to find an easy way to make people redundant, lets give everyone that's done that a 'formal written warning' and a 6 month probation that means if they're sick twice in 6 months then they'll be on a 'final written warning'

In the meantime, if you're off for over 21 days, it's long term sickness and doesn't go on your absence record

How can this not lead to 'sorry boss, I've got a bit of a cold, ill see you in 22 days time'

Treat people fairly not equally!




Bye bye for now