The employer as the promoter of happiness at work: the i-mens story

Using experimental absenteeism conversations, i-mens aims to identify the various causes of absenteeism and find an approach to increase the employability of each employee. These discussions took place in the 51 teams where short-term absenteeism was highest.

“The remarkable thing in this story is that the conversations were not conducted by the team managers,” explains absenteeism expert Bart Teuwen. “Instead, Mensura trained seven i-mens employees to be well-being coaches. They taught them to conduct a friendly yet businesslike dialogue about absenteeism, and how to recognise signs of potential absenteeism in good time.”

In addition to that, i-mens used tools to make absenteeism measurable and improve reporting. A valuable extra that is perfectly aligned with their data-driven approach.

To add support to the absenteeism conversations, i-mens – with assistance from Mensura – issued clear internal communication about the objectives of the new absenteeism policy. This meant that the organisation clearly explained the rights of sick employees, how to report in sick correctly, and applicable policies on checks and sanctions.

“In general, the emphasis lay on a positive approach: how do we work together to ensure that every employee feels happy?” explains Eva Mangelschots, HR Director at i-mens. “We wanted to create better awareness, trust, and support. In this way, employees sense and understand that it’s okay to talk about the reasons behind absenteeism: mental health issues, troubles at home, and so on.”

But what did all this achieve? Some nice figures, in fact; i-mens managed to drop its absenteeism by 11% to 4.46% in 2023. That led not only to savings of just over 1 million euros of protected income, there was also a generous and immediate return on the costs of the absenteeism policy. And even more important: employees stayed healthy because the drop in short-term absenteeism did not lead to an increase in (medium-)term absenteeism.

This approach revealed all kinds of refreshing insights. The success of the absenteeism conversations showed the importance of an open discussion culture based on trust. After all, this sense of trust increased the well-being of the employees and enhanced the reputation of i-mens as a caring employer that takes the individual needs of all employees seriously.

Plus, it was clear that a good relationship between employees and their work schedule managers is essential. Indeed, at i-mens, carers, cleaning assistants, and nurses are all in close contact with those planners. A good connection between those two parties resulted in less people reporting sick within the teams because that very connection meant that open absenteeism conversations could take place spontaneously.

Not all causes of absenteeism are within reach of the i-mens approach. In fact, employees increasingly encounter clients in difficult living conditions, run-down houses, and also experience harassment. Carers are not trained to handle this, so absenteeism becomes a kind of coping mechanism.

“We start training our colleagues to tackle this positively from the very first day at work,” continues Eva, “and also to make these concerns something that can be discussed within our own teams. We include this wherever and whenever we can at the policy level. Of course, the key to solving this lies there as well.”

“The success at i-mens shows that employers are perfectly able to take action themselves in order to actively improve well-being in the workplace and happiness at work,” confirms Bart. “i-mens is still experimenting with well-being coaches.”

The moral of the story? “Listen carefully to your employees so that you know what they need. Then take responsibility yourself, as well, to give them optimum support based on those needs. Because it really works – just look at i-mens.”