Absenteeism May Be Linked To Employee's Personality

Today, almost two out of three employees who don’t show up for work are not physically ill, making unscheduled absenteeism rates the highest since they were last measured in 1999.  The work environment can be one reason for absentee problems, but so can a worker’s personality. West Chester organizational psychologist, Stefani Yorges says an impulsive employee who feels a sense of entitlement, is a risk taker and has very liberal views about attendance and work ethic is more likely to have an absentee problem than someone who is conscientious.

“A company’s absentee problem isn’t always attributable to its work environment,” says Yorges. “Certainly, an organization needs to be concerned with how much stress their employees are experiencing, how satisfied they are with management and their motivational level.

“What also predicts absenteeism is the individual personality of the employee: what is their work ethic, their sense of entitlement on the job and their attitude toward being absent.”

Yorges, who has written extensively about absenteeism, its source and the role supervisors should play in managing it, claims companies have the tools to predict absenteeism based on applicants’ personalities, and that they should use them in hiring decisions.

In an article published in the August issue of Reliable Plant Magazine entitled, “The bell-shaped curve of absenteeism,” Yorges reports on the key characteristics of those employees with the highest levels of voluntary absenteeism. In her survey of 800 employees in four different manufacturing plants, she found that those with an absenteeism problem tended to be the most dissatisfied with the job they were doing, and personality-wise, the least conscientious and most impulsive.

The “rule benders,” as she describes them, also were found to hold “the most liberal views about attendance and work ethic, had demonstrated attendance problems in the past, had the most health problems and admitted a significant use of alcohol and drugs.”

Yorges believes that identifying links between personality characteristics and absenteeism gives organizations additional information that should result in better hiring decisions.

“Given the high costs of absenteeism in dollars and company morale, organizations might want to begin to target characteristics such as conscientiousness and impulsivity as part of the hiring process,” suggests Yorges.

“Asking a few questions on their applications or during interviews that address prior absenteeism or other problem behaviors can help identify high-risk individuals before they are hired,” says Yorges.

A professor in West Chester University’s graduate psychology program for the past 11 years, Yorges specializes in issues related to organizational behavior, particularly absenteeism, turnover and withdrawal behaviors.  A graduate of Hastings College in Nebraska, she earned her Ph.D. in industrial organizational psychology from Purdue University.