Corporate and Individual Responsibility – H1N1

Last night I had a conversation with a good friend.  He’d called his company’s HR due to an employee issue……

One of his co-workers has two children that have been diagnosed with H1N1.  The swine flu.  The co-worker came in to work yesterday extremely sick.  Most likely they’ve got the swine flu too.  And there they were, dealing with customers, making change, and most likely making physical contact with the customers.

So, my friend called his HR group.  A reasonable move if you ask me.

Back in my network engineering days I’d always get aggravated when co-workers came in sick.  Normally I’d have the same thing within days, and I’d work from home.  My thought……don’t pass the thing around.  Fortunately, when I became management I had a clear policy.  Switch techs, engineers, and the rest of the staff who shared the building with me were sent home or told to stay home.  Getting the entire staff sick doesn’t help get work done.  Who would think that’s a sensible option????

Oh, wait….most people would rather use their sick days as personal days.  I totally forgot.  My solution, I never reported sick days to my HR group.  My staff worked very hard for me, and if they needed a day or two they could have it.  Simple positive management, don’t you think?

I do have to say, I know the company my friend works for.  And the management there discourages people from taking sick days.  Actually they make it nearly impossible to take a sick day.  I know this from personal experience.  A call in resulted in, “We can’t get anyone to cover you, you’ve got to come in.”  Really?  Great.

Well, I’m proud of my friend for calling the HR group.  If H1N1 is really that bad, you’d hate to be the company spreading it around to the people of Prescott.  “I got my new computer the other day, and H1N1 all for one low price…….”  Yeah, bet you’d loose customers really fast gang!

Oh, and if you’ve got the flu or worse, don’t stop in to visit me.  Pop by and see me when you’re healthy.  The root canal was enough for the Fall, I’d like to avoid any more down time.  Thanks in advance!  🙂