A new report has found that Public Servants working for the Canadian Province of Ontario took fewer sick days in the first several months of the COVID-19 pandemic while working from home than they did over the same period in previous years.
On average, the roughly 60,000 Public Servants working in the Province’s Ministries, Agencies and Crown Corporations took one fewer sick day between March and July than they did in 2017, 2018, and 2019, according to Ontario’s Treasury Board.
Human Resources expert, Nita Chhinzer (pictured) said the drop was partially because fewer Public Servants were getting sick with seasonal colds or the flu since they were working remotely.
“If they were sick they were more likely to work through it at home,” Professor Chhinzer said.
The University of Guelph Professor said some studies showed that people were more productive working remotely than they were in the office.
“We have control over when we work, and how we work, and that control means that we are essentially over-working ourselves,” Professor Chhinzer said.
“Another factor is that people were abusing sick days in the past to do things such as go to picnics, extend holidays and take days off when they just needed a bit of a breather,” she said.
“Now there’s nothing to do. So why take that fake sick day?”
In the past few years, the Province’s Public Servants took an average of four to four-and-a-half sick days between March and July, but during the pandemic that number dropped to three days.
Professor Chhinzer said there were also other hidden pressures that kept employees from taking sick days while working from home, especially in industries where people had been let go during the pandemic.
“Those survivors are trying to deal with a higher volume of work and they’re feeling guilty that their colleagues have been let go — but they haven’t — so as a result they’re actually working more,” she said.
Toronto, 25 September 2020
