Question

Dear HR Professionals,

I would like to hear from you, as an HR professional what will you do:

1. When it is time for the appraisal, will you take a look at the person's medical leave for the year? For example, there are two high performing staff but you can promote one. Staff 1 has taken medical leave quite a number of times while Staff 2 has not. What you will do?

2. The staff is leaving and within my management's business standpoint, he/she is not able to use up all of his/her benefit entitlement up. What is your view on this?

Thanks

YP

Reply 1

Apart from Leave entitlement which you have to pay out, benefits usually are a privilege and usually to be utilized or consumed while still employed. Not sure what benefits you are referring to, sick leave? It's clear that sick leave is not cumulative and 14 days is by the calendar year.

I think promotion is purely base on performance and capabilities and clearly, one who is prone to sickness does not affect his output and results. If that being the case then I would probably think that he is even more efficient or productive compared to his peers. Also, you did not mention if he is perpetually sick or pretends to be sick... evidence had proven that even if he is sick prone but still he delivers thus this is a reason to penalize him. if out of your 10 selection criteria sickness is one and the 2 candidates are on par, then it's clear who you should have promoted instead.

SY

Reply 2

1. If both staffs' performance are the same but staff 1 has taken frequent medical leave, it may affect the performance rating but again it also depends on the situation (eg. reasons for taking frequent medical leave).

2. The leaving staff may use the benefit entitlement pro-rated up to his / her last working day. It will be a good practice to specify such conditions in the employment contract, HR policy or staff handbook to avoid any misunderstanding or argument.

CH