Canadian HR RepoRteR January 26, 2015
News 11
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97%
50.1%
58%
89.6%
44.3%
21.6%
17%
Types of time-off policies organizations provide
paid
vacation
unpaid
vacation
personal
days
paid
sick days
unpaid
sick days
religious
observance
(beyond
stat
holidays)
Charitable/
volunteer work
1.5%
12.9%
67.9%
17.7%
Vacation usage
All employees
use all their
vacation time
Most
employees
use all their
vacation time
Some
employees
use all their
vacation time
Few
employees
use all their
vacation time
Goal Average score
(out of 6)
Retention
Recruitment
Work-life balance
Compliance/risk
mitigation
Labour cost
management
Employer
branding/culture
4.36
4.03
4.01
2.97
2.87
2.77
Top goals in shaping a time-off policy
(ranked from most important to least)
61. 4%
21. 9%
16. 7%
How often do organizations
examine their time-off policy?
At least
annually
Thoughts on managing time off
we asked respondents if they had any additional thoughts or comments after completing the
survey. Here are some of the responses:
•"Most of (our) leaves are bereavement leaves which are easily managed through software (a
timesheet program). really it is only Std/Ltd leaves which are increasingly complicated to
case manage."
• "Feelings of entitlement from some employees to take various leaves with questionable
rationales can reduce morale among other employees."
• "we also have a vacation purchase program where employees who have four weeks or less
of vacation entitlement can purchase an additional fi ve days of vacation."
• "Our company shuts down from dec. 24 to Jan. 2. All full-time workers receive paid time off
for this, not included in the vacation policy."
• "we started to enforce employees using vacation as some were carrying too long, then they
would take a lot at once, get behind and want to work overtime to 'catch up,' accumulating
more leave."
• "we are not able to pay as well as comparable employers so we attempt to offset through
generous leave benefi ts."
• "Employees using all their sick leave still want their paid vacation and other holidays. (that)
makes it hard to get the work done and other staff resent fi lling in constantly."