Dougal Sutherland: Presenteeism, losing work for mental and physical health

Most people know about the impact mental and physical health can have on absenteeism (i.e., being off work due to ill-health) and the associated effect this has on productivity.

People are less familiar with presenteeism – that’s where you go to work with mental or physical health problems and don’t function to the full extent of your ability

• Hidden cost as difficult to spot

• 25% of the 8500 people we surveyed said they had experienced presenteeism in the past month

• Impact on their work is, on average, working 33% below best possible performance

• Cost of $2000 per month per employee (based on average salary estimates)

• More than $46billion cost per annum to NZ if extrapolate that across all orgs – note that this is an estimate and we need more research

• Lower productivity can be due to:

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:07):
You're listening to the Saturday Morning with Jack team podcast
from News Talks that'd be.

Speaker 2 (00:12):
Clinical psychologist Google Sutherland is all with us this morning,
calder Doogle.

Speaker 3 (00:17):
Sure, Jack, I's to be with you again.

Speaker 2 (00:19):
We started the show this morning by talking about the
program Adolescence, which has it didn't just rely on my
Rave review, has had gazillions of Rave reviews and tens
of millions of views since it went live on Netflix
a couple of weeks ago.

Speaker 3 (00:33):
You've seen it, yes, absolutely, Binge watched it in tonight.

Speaker 2 (00:38):
Ah, how good? Okay, So as a clinical psychologist without
giving two much of the plot away, how did that
impact the way that you watched the show?

Speaker 1 (00:50):
Do you know what?

Speaker 3 (00:50):
It hit me more a little bit like you were
talking about at the start of the show, that actually
hit me more on a personal level, particularly that final episode,
thinking about my role as a dad and as a
father and what I have you know, and how I've
parented my son. Yeah, and I've just found it really
I think there was particularly and I found that last episode,

(01:13):
I guess from a psychological perspective too, really fascinating, all
the little subtle things that the father does and says,
and the way he acts that just you can just
see how that's just sown some seeds in his son,
and not deliberately, not in a but but just some
of the ways that he interacts and how what he's

(01:34):
modeled for his son, and about how he struggled to
he talked about I just tried to be better than
my dad. Yeah, and so I think it was. I
was really affected by it the whole next day, and
I just it's amazing on so many levels, as you know,
as you've talked about with the one track shot and
and but just on a psychological and what it says

(01:56):
about how to be a guy and how to raise
kids and how to raise sons. It's just amazing.

Speaker 2 (02:01):
Yeah. Did you did you know the episode two when
they have the or it's a three when it's just
the child clinical psychologist and the main in the boy
in a room. I mean, like, I'm not expecting you've
been in those situations, but was that accurate? Do you
think was that kind of a I've.

Speaker 3 (02:20):
Been and I haven't been. I haven't done a court report,
but I've certainly been. I've certainly met with young people
who are in that sort of environment. And yeah, look
there were aspects of it that are true. But also
I think, you know, my experience with young people is

(02:41):
often that they are quite really able to talk and
reflect and you know, but I think there was something
just you know, there was just glimmers of something in
that young thirteen year old that were slightly disturbing and
slightly worrying. But I think it's a relatively realistic portrayal
of yeah goes on. It's certainly much more realistic than
somebody lying on a couch and talking.

Speaker 2 (03:02):
About yeah, yeah, yeah exactly.

Speaker 3 (03:03):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (03:03):
Yeah. Anyway, well I'm glad. I'm glad you found it
affecting as well. I've been ranting on down about it
this morning, which is what good art does. That's it's
you know, it is what it is. Anyway, we're talking
about presenteeism this morning. Now, people will be familiar with absentism.
Absents absenteeism is a problem. Is presentism an issue as well?

Speaker 1 (03:29):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (03:29):
Well, look this is on the back of We're just
at Umbrella. We've just released some research and we've talked
to over eight and a half thousand people. Presenteeism is
that is when you turn up for work, so you're
physically present, but you're carrying with you some sort of
mental health or physical health condition that leads you to

(03:50):
work at less than your normal one hundred productivity. Right,
So it's it's, it's and it's it's a hidden cost.
We actually we estimated, and this is a broad estimate,
we estimated it's costing over forty billion dollars per year
in lost productivity because it's hidden, you know, because somebody
can be sitting at their des score in their workplace

(04:12):
wherever that is, and they're physically there, so it appears
that so it can get overlooked, but actually they're not
really producing at their full capacity. So it's a hidden
cost and lots of people aren't really aware of it.

Speaker 2 (04:25):
Yeah, that's so twenty five percent of eight and a
half thousand people surveyed, so they had kind of experienced it.
So talk to us about the impact on a workplace, Like,
in what ways does someone experiencing presenteers talk us through
the different ways it affects a business.

Speaker 3 (04:43):
Yeah, look, and I think we can all relate to it.
That's on some level. We've all had a day when
you're just not quite firing on all cylinders, right, and
you get those things like low energy, you're distracted, it's
harder to focus, you might find it more difficult to
finish things or to make quick decisions. And for most

(05:04):
of us, you know that that might be pre you know,
on the odd day. But you know, we had twenty
five percent of the people we surveyed said that they
regularly experienced this up to about the time equivalent is
about six days per month. So imagine, you know, that's
six days per month where you are not really there.

(05:24):
And I think too, there's a potential, particularly if you're
working with machinery, heavy machinery or transport, that you can
make lapses in judgment or make small mistakes that could
have quite a major cost or major you know, major
effect done on your health for other people's. So it's
not like people are deliberately doing this, but they're just
their mind is on something else that they're they're worried

(05:46):
about something that that there, you know, there's been an
argument at home, and their minds on that instead, or
they're they're you know, their mood is low and they
can't really bring themselves to fully to work as they
usually would.

Speaker 2 (05:58):
Yeah, right, okay, and I mean the cost can be significant.
So two thousand dollars a month per employee, which is
if you if you're extrapolated out of across the whole
of New Zealand, that's billions and billions of dollars, like
teens of billions of dollars. So what can we kind
of do about it?

Speaker 3 (06:16):
Look, I think I think, to be honest, we're just
this is an emerging area for many organizations. There's lots
of international research that is that that has established us
as a presence in the workplace, But for New Zealand,
it's still sort of we're just starting the conversation. And
I'd say to workplaces, look, it's really important that you
actually get an accurate assessment of how you're going in

(06:37):
this area, because you know, as you've said that we've
made an estimate and extrapolated that out of across the population,
but that will vary across different workplaces and work sites.
So I'd say to organizations, get a handle on it.
You know, how much of an issue is it at
your place, and then look at the way that your
workplace is. How are people comfortable coming to work and saying, hey, look,

(07:00):
I'm not I'm not fully I'm not fully here today
I'm not. I'm not. I'm not at one hundred, and
either being courage to take a day off of sick
leave if that's possible, or to be able to have
some sort of flexibility in their work where their manager
or colleagues or coworkers can say, hey, look, we'll take
that extra bit off you today, you know, and recognizing

(07:23):
that it could be us tomorrow that needs that kind
of support. So it's how can we flexibly deal with
us and not just pretend it doesn't exist.

Speaker 2 (07:30):
Yeah, right, that makes a lot of sense. Hey, thank
you Doogle. I really appreciate that someone from Umbrella Well
being there with us this morning.

Speaker 1 (07:38):
For more from Saturday Morning with Jack Tame, listen live
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