“Being on time for work is a virtue.”
Lateness at a personal level is largely between friends with little to no dire consequences. But in business * the corporate world, as an employee, punctuality takes on a totally new significance. Being late or behind schedule carries intangible costs & actual huge financial implications.
Breakdown of Lateness to No. of Workings Per Year:
When a worker is habitually late by just 10 minutes a day, it is equivalent to giving him/her 5 extra periods of leave.
No. of Minutes Late Per Day X No. Of Workings Days In A Year:
10 X 250
= 2500 minutes
(Assume 250 Working Days Per Year)
Next, Convert This Figure To Number Of Working Days In A Year:
No. of Minutes / 60 / 8
= 2500 / 60 / 8
= 5.2 days
(Assume 8 Hours In 1 Working Day)
Convert the No. of Late Days In A Year To Dollar Value:
Now that you know the costs to the company, let’s take a step further & convert this to dollars and cents.
Assume this employee is drawing $2,000 per month, with 20 working days per month.
Cost of Employee Lateness To Company:
= Monthly Salary / No. of working days per month X No. of days late
= $2,000 / 20 / 5.2
= $520
Impact To Company
We have now established that the costs of one worker who is consistently late for a year would be $520 a year.
But this may not be a significant amount for some companies. We get it, nothing wrong with that.
However, let us scale up the values so the true impact can be felt:
In a company with 100 employees, if everyone is late by an average of 10 minutes per day, this costs the company $52,000.
In a company of 1,000 employees, if everyone is late by an average of 10 minutes per day employees, the cost is $520,000!
Your Thoughts?
Being late by just 10 minutes may appear to be a trivial matter. After all, there are many reasons for this – heavy traffic, late nights, etc.
It’s only too easy to think lightly of it & ignore the situation. But when the company examines its’ operational costs from a holistic viewpoint would the true cost of lateness to the company be revealed.
Over to you: What is the cost of lateness for your company?
In the next article, we will be sharing on how to effectively capture & manage workplace attendance (including remotely) & the possible ways to reduce lateness, & each of their pros & cons.
Stay Tuned.