It is extremely critical in today’s ever-changing and unexpected business environment to ensure that through effective employee management Human Resources (HR) professionals are constantly encouraging personal days off work to employees. Specifically, a personal day off work is commonly utilised in cases of emergencies, moving days or even to allow employees to go to the dentist or other important appointments outside of work. Although, personal days off have been utilised to effectively allow employees to rest and recover from immense and long periods of hard work.

Research shows when HR encourages employees to take personal days off work it could be seen that an improvement in motivation, avoidance of burnout, increased job satisfaction levels and further reduced employee stress may be found to name a few benefits of encouraging personal days off work. Likewise, it is extremely common for managers to encourage employees to take personal days off work to effectively achieve the associated benefits. Correspondingly, to go in more depth below are the top 8 reasons why HR should encourage personal days off work.

Improves Motivation

When HR encourages personal days off work a corresponding improvement to motivation levels may be found. Specifically, when employees are happy in their personal lives and further find that they can have more flexibility in their work-life, they’ll be increasingly motivated to work harder and aim for greater levels of success.

Furthermore, when a HR manager is encouraging employees to take personal days off through communication or rewards, employees become extremely more motivated to work within the organisation they are in. This is largely because the organisation wishes to ensure employees are happy and further employees are found to want to satisfy management.

Avoids Burnout

When HR effectively encourages personal days off work employees are less likely to burnout while at work. When employees are overwhelmed in both their work-life and personal life it becomes extremely dangerous for the employees mental and physical health. Likewise, to avoid exhaustion and the serious threat of burnout, HR will encourage personal days off.

Through encouraging personal days off work the overwhelming pressure that causes burnout may be reduced as employees will have time off work to rest and further reorganise themselves to have a greater experience whilst at work. Furthermore, personal days off give employees a chance to solve any personal problems they have that causes anxiety and leads to employee burnout at work.

Reduces Stress

HR should encourage personal days off work as it tremendously reduces employee stress levels. Specifically, following on the avoidance of burnout, one factor that is associated with immense work and pressure is heightened levels of stress. Although, when HR encourages employees to take a step back and relax through personal days off, this large amount of stress may be relieved.

Moreover, employees often feel an immense pressure of stress through a variety of factors which may include organisational fear, task responsibilities and further low levels of morale. Although these stress factors are effectively mitigated and, on some levels, removed when management encourages personal days off as employees find management cares more about their wellbeing and abilities.

Time to Plan

Another extremely great reason for HR professionals to encourage personal days off is that it allows organisational employees to have free time to plan. Specifically, when taking a personal day off employees will have the ability to spend some time during the day finding better ways to organise themselves and plan for the future.

When employees plan ahead, they are able to address a variety of issues such as how to manage their personal work-life balance, how to tackle upcoming tasks and further what to do in the following weeks or even long term. In turn, HR managers often allow employees to take personal days off as it allows employees to have time to plan ahead.

Realign Goals

HR professionals often encourage employees to take personal days off work as it allows employees to realign goals. Often when employees have time off work, they are able to reflect on a variety of things. The reflection undertaken could include either personal or work life reflecting, through which employees may consider what goals they would like to achieve in the near future.

Employees are given this opportunity to spend some time to think effectively with extensive time and detail about what goals they would like to achieve and how they may further align work goals to the current goals of the overall organisation they are working within. Throughout this period with the right material and resources given to the employee, HR managers may provide a chance for employees to reflect on cascading goals.

Sparks Creativity

HR will continually encourage employees to take personal days off work as it effectively sparks creativity. Employee’s demand and long for better work-life balance and flexibility, when HR correspondingly encourages personal days off, employees will feel heightened happiness. Employees are able to gain free time to themselves to recharge, relax and refresh themselves.

Likewise, when the refreshed employee comes back to work, they are able to come back with higher levels of creativity as they are less stressed, more open-minded and where given time to reflect over a wide variety of things. Moreover, a further benefit associated with creativity that is attained is increased engagement and productivity of employees throughout the organisation that HR managers wish to achieve.

Improved Retention

When HR effectively encourages employees to take personal days off work, they are able to improve retentionlevels. Specifically, this is due to employees finding that the organisation cares for them which correspondingly means that employees will be increasingly happier to work for the organisation they are currently in.

Moreover, through receiving personal days off employees attain benefits of increased satisfaction, creativity, lowered stress and increased motivation which encourages employees to stay working in an organisation that promotes positive employee benefits to be attained.

Increased Satisfaction

Finally, when HR encourages employees to take personal days off work, they are able to increase employee satisfaction levels. This is largely due to employees being increasingly satisfied with an organisation that encourages employees to take time off work to resolve any present issues or even just to rest to come back to work stronger.

Employees will be deeply grateful for organisations that allow personal days off, which in turn increases satisfaction levels, yet also further build respect and loyalty as the employee trusts the organisation to guide the employee on the path of a positive lifestyle and further working career success.

The Definitive Guide to Employee Engagement