While many enterprises are concerned about the costs of such programs, they may not be aware that studies show an actual cost savings from creating a working employee assistance program.
One major positive result of an employee assistance program is a competitive advantage in the marketplace. A workforce that is enduring chronic stress is less manageable and less productive. Stress can manifest in many ways which hurt your business, including lack of courtesy, less creativity, lack of concentration, lack of motivation, and employee absenteeism. Employees with mental health or personal problems typically have a work performance of at least 35% below normal.
Absenteeism has obvious costs to any enterprise. Employee assistance programs providing intervention in cases of substance abuse, major life events, and chronic stress problems can drastically decrease the number of days missed.
Many employees have personal or family problems that prevent them from attending work which can be resolved or mitigated through an employee assistance program. Because 5.6% of the average enterprises payroll is spent on absenteeism, a cost of less than 1% for an employee assistance program is a huge cost savings.
Another major benefit to employers is a decrease in turnover. In 65 to 80 percent of cases, the cause for termination is due to personal or interpersonal factors rather than an inability to perform the job. An employee assistance program is designed to help resolve precisely these type of issues before termination is necessary.
For example, an employee could get free counselling services to learn to manage workplace stress effectively, or two workers with an interpersonal dispute could seek out mediation in order to resolve the problem. Terminating an employee has many negative effects, including loss of workplace morale, disruption to work processes, and increased costs to the enterprise for recruiting, hiring, placement, and training.
Even a small reduction in turnover can have huge impacts on an enterprises bottom line. For example, replacing a single clerical worker has a cost of nearly GBP 2,000, replacing a member of technical staff can cost GBP 7,000 or more.Stress and personal problems can also create unforeseen problems such as workplace accidents, injuries, and disabilities. Studies show that stress contributes to 85% of accidents.
If an employee assistance program helps reduce the workplace disruption and morale problems of a single significant workplace accident, it can likely pay for an entire year of the programs cost.One study of employees in an automobile plant showed dramatic changes from implementing an employee assistance program in order to specifically offer support for alcoholic employees. This created a huge difference in the workplace.
For example, absenteeism decreased by 56 percent, disciplinary problems decreased by 63 percent, and workplace accidents decreased by 82 percent. The relative cost savings of an employee assistance program will, in most cases, far outweigh the initial financial cost.
Richard Reid of
Pinnacle Proactive, Specialists in the
Employee
Assistance Program,
Stress Management,
Staff Retention & Absenteeism. Take a Proactive Approach in Growing Your
Organisation