Absenteeism from work was at its lowest level in five years in 2023, according to Acerta's latest barometer published on Friday. Workers were present for 83% of their working time on average, or 208 days for a full-time employee.
This level of productivity has "never been so high in recent years," according to the barometer. It was 0.8 percentage points higher than in 2022, which was the first year in which productivity reached its pre-pandemic level. "In other words, less time was spent on sick leave, holidays, career breaks and temporary unemployment last year," commented Acerta.
The main reason for absence remained illness: an average of 7.9% of working time (19.7 days for a full-time employee) was not performed for this reason. This was followed by holidays (6.3% of working time), career breaks or time credits (3.2%), and temporary or economic unemployment (0.4%).
Acerta noted that "absence due to illness is clearly more of a problem in large companies than in small and medium-sized enterprises [SMEs]." According to its data, 9.9% of employees take time off work in large companies compared to just 5% in SMEs.
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"As it would seem illogical to say that small companies recruit healthier people than large ones, or that there are automatically more health risks in large companies than in small ones, the cause (and therefore the solution) must be sought within individual companies," noted legal expert at Acerta, Amandine Boseret.
According to one survey, three components are essential to feeling good at work: sufficient autonomy, a sense of involvement, and the certainty of having the necessary skills to carry out one's tasks.
"Companies with a high absenteeism rate would therefore do well to analyse these three components within their organisation," she concluded.
