World Cup starts tomorrow!

Every 4 years it is that time again… the FIFA World Cup (and it starts tomorrow in case you’ve been living under a rock and don’t care about football.)

Last time, when the 32 team, month long tournament was held in South Africa, employers could hardly open a newspaper without being bombarded with information about sickness absence and the effect that the world’s largest single sports event could have on staff absence levels. This time around it has been a lot quieter and only in the last few weeks have a few publications and organisations started writing about it (some of it has even just been re-publishing of guidelines from 2010…)

One of the key reasons for this is that due to the time difference between Brazil and the UK, meaning that the general starting times for games are 17:00, 20:00, 21:00 and 23:00. This is not a repeat of the 2002 World Cup in Japan where people had to get up in the middle of the night to support their team, nor is there any issue of it impacting the office within normal working hours to anywhere near the same extent as the 2010 World Cup.

There has only been one headline-grabbing statistic and that is that almost two thirds of employees would consider pulling a sickie if their team was to reach the semis or the final. Fortunately, for employers, and perhaps less fortunately for England fans, there is very little likelihood of this even happening. As of today, England are (at best) a long shot with SkyBet at 25/1, joint 8^th favourite with 2006 winners Italy. Odds on reaching the showpiece event on Sunday the 13^th of July in Rio are 11/1 and 5/1 on England reaching the semi-finals. Let’s assume for a second that England were actually to make the semis. What would this really mean for the staff absence levels of your organisation? The three matches in question are being played on Tuesday the 8th at 21:00, Wednesday the 9^th at 21:00 and Sunday the 13^th at 20:00. This means that there is likely to be negligible disruption to business on the day in question and the only issue would be somebody choosing to pull a sickie the following day.

The draw has put England in a tough group, but the match kick-off times are (mostly) good news to the employers worried about World Cup related staff absence. The first game is this Saturday at 11 p.m. against Italy, followed by an 8 p.m. kick-off on Thursday the 19^th against Uruguay, and the final group game against Costa Rica takes place on Tuesday the 24^th of June at 5 p.m. If England were to make it out of the so called “Group of Death”, they could potentially face Colombia, Ivory Coast, Japan or Greece in the Round of 16. These games will take place on Saturday the 28^th and Sunday the 29^th of June, respectively, with any potential quarterfinal for England then happening on the following weekend.

All in all, there is not necessarily a lot to get worried about when it comes to absence management during this World Cup, but below we have highlighted a few of the things you can do if you still want to make 100% sure that staff absence won’t be an issue.

And, even if a miracle were to happen and England will go all the way, this might not be a bad thing for employee productivity. Research undertaken in London during the Olympics showed that there was no impact on absence and productivity levels, but that staff morale received a boost. This is likely to happen for employees again if England were to win the World Cup. Come on England!

TOP TIPS FOR ENSURING THE WORLD CUP DOESN’T IMPACT ON ABSENCE

Take the time to, realistically, consider the logistical and operational challenges your company is likely to face – and how they will affect your business. Once you have identified these, it becomes a lot easier to plan ahead using some of our suggestions below:

Ensure that any leave is planned well in advance to minimise disruptions to business operations. If you have special rules in place for the World Cup, e.g. allowing people to leave work early or come in late to allow employees to watch games, ensure that these rules are communicated – and remember to stress the point that they are only in place for a limited time!
Ensure any unplanned staff absence is carefully recorded, monitored and analysed. Make sure managers are informed by employees at the earliest possible time regarding any unplanned absences.
Look at using the World Cup for teambuilding exercises. Why not screen England’s final group game against Costa Rica on Tuesday the 24^th of June at 5 p.m. to pull staff together and improve employee morale?
Use of the internet and social media. This is a key area. With the proliferation of usage of social media since the 2010 World Cup, this is probably the most important area to have a policy for as staff are likely to spend time looking at match reports and World Cup related rumours. Our suggestions would be to write a daily staff bulletin about the World Cup and circulate that, while ensuring that your policy on internet and social media usage in your organisation is enforced.
Finally, make sure that any time off and leave is booked in accordance with your policy, without any favouritism. Make sure that employees fairly request time off and if you find an issue with staff taking unauthorised time off without good reason, consider disciplinary procedures.