One in 5 employees misses work due to stress, not sickness, a recently released survey from a professional staffing firm reports.
Though illness remains the primary causeof unplanned absences, staffing company Randstad’s 2006 Employee Review shows 21 percent of workers nationwide take “mental health days” when stress becomes overwhelming.
Those most likely to be absent, however, are the youngest workers. Compared to employees age 42 and older, workers age 18 to 26 are twice as likely to call in sick due to stress and four times as likely to use sick days to run personal errands.
Mar Kuhlkin, district manager for Randstad in Washington, explained young people often live on their own and have smaller support networks.
“They’re really at the beginning of their work lives, and generally speaking, that means not yet having a family and probably not yet even having a partner that they can fall back on and take turns calling the plumber or taking the car to the DMV,” she said.
This age group — known as “Generation Y” — brings different expectations to the workplace, said Caren Goldberg, assistant professor of management at American University.
“I think there’s more of an expectation among that group that work should not be overwhelming,” she said, “whereas older generations feel like, ‘Yeah, I’m under a lot of stress, but that’s just the way work is.’ ”
Eve Cary, 21, who used to take a day each month to decompress from her information management job, said her peers put a higher premium on mental health, but older generations have no sympathy.
“Whenever I tell my mother that I’m taking one of these days, she tells me to suck it up,” Cary said.
Absenteeism among younger workers might not necessarily hurt the bottom line, however. Generation Y is more technologically savvy, possibly increasing their productivity and reducing the time they need to spend in the office.
“It’s more what you get done, not how long you sit in your chair,” Kuhlkin said.
Companies can reduce stress-related absences among all age groups by enabling employees to work fewer and more flexible hours, encouraging them to take sick days when necessary and providing stress management training, Kuhlkin added.
