• Numbers of sick leave days rising.
• New generation of workers changing approach.
• Managers may be unskilled in HR practices.

The second big wave of workplace changes is happening now, with the arrival of Gen Z in employment. The COVID epidemic brought about the acceptance, to varying degrees, of hybrid work. But now, a new, arguably more entitled consciousness is creeping into the workplace as Gen Z reaches the age at which it has to make a living.

Approaches to hybrid work are much-contested around sick leave, and attitudes to paid time off for illness vary from country to country and company to company.

Speaking in Business Insider, Rue Dooley, an HR advisor at the Society for Human Resource Management, said the accepted norm of a worker’s mentality – that the more an individual works, the better they are – is beginning to lose its dominance. That accepted norm has lasted for generations, despite some geographies enacting employment legislation to protect workers from disciplinary action or even dismissal should they happen to be unlucky enough to fall ill.

“Behaviour doesn’t change overnight, but Gen Z has a different way of thinking and communicating. Younger workers are behaving in such a way that it is an entitlement: ‘I should get time off when I need it without having to get special permission or feeling judged or condemned,'” he said.

Rise in sick leave days taken

Despite the rise in sick leave taken by UK workers (sick leave increased from 5.8 days in 2019 to 7.8 days in 2023), hybrid workers are likely to continue working from home despite minor ailments, where previously they might have called in sick and taken the day off. That’s according to the University of Manchester’s Cary Cooper, a professor of organisational psychology.

“If you’re very poorly, I don’t think people should be working,” Cooper said. “Even if [you] can do a few emails here and there, you really need recuperation.”

Hybrid work patterns, therefore, help workers stay productive despite minor illnesses, but the hybrid model exacerbates serious mental health issues and exhaustion from long-term illnesses. The temptation is that despite chronic and sometimes worsening health conditions, people keep working from home rather than take a distinct break and stop work to recuperate.

In the US, the working environment is less attractive for workers, with nearly one in four US private industry workers not entitled to any sick pay. Despite this, US employees are taking more time off sick, likely thanks to COVID raising awareness of the possibilities of infecting co-workers.

Generational approaches to sick leave days

In terms of generational shift, however, the normality of omnipresent digital communication means Gen Z is well-equipped to be online and, therefore, available during work hours, wherever the employee might happen to be. That blurs the boundaries around work, according to Dooley. “If you are strategic, conscientious, and you have access, you can be much more efficient, and you can have this work-life balance,” he said.

Therefore, there is the possibility of a generational culture clash between millennial/Gen X/Gen Y bosses and Gen Z staff. Where the former is used to and therefore most comfortable enforcing a strict workplace ethic, Gen Z employees are more likely to be more casual, especially about physical attendance. On the whole, Gen Z values its work-life balance more actively.

Both experts agreed that it’s up to managers to strike a sensitive balance to employees taking sick leave days. “True leaders grasp that in terms of productivity, it’s better in the long term to allow people that time for their well-being over short-term productivity,” Dooley told Business Insider.

Part of the potential for miscommunication and friction over what’s acceptable in terms of sick leave springs from the fact that, often, line managers and supervisors get promoted due to their ability in their specialisation rather than because they possess innate HR skills. Professor Cooper said, “People don’t leave a job; they leave a boss.”

That also chimes with the Peter principle, which postulates that employees are promoted to a level higher than their ability in an organisation, at which point their poor performance prevents further movement up the hierarchy.

But whatever the causes of dispute between managers and staff over sickness-related absence, learning or being trained in HR methods should not be the sole purview of the HR department. Wherever employees are in charge of the conduct of others, an understanding of the many issues at play is important. That understanding can’t be developed by mere assimilation of an organisation’s ethos, nor does it appear from long-held personal views on work ethics. HR departments need to be proactive in spreading best practices throughout their organisations at all levels, from the (virtual) factory floor up.