Nerea, an administrative worker with years of experience managing sick leave in human resources departments, said on the Spanish television program laSexta Xplica that rank-and-file employees go to work while ill out of fear of repercussions.
She said average workers lived with constant fear of taking sick leave because it could affect their productivity and lead to accusations that they could not afford to fall ill.
A pattern seen from inside a multinational
Nerea worked until three years ago at a multinational company with a branch of roughly 400 employees. Part of her job was managing absenteeism, which let her observe a pattern she said repeated systematically among operational and administrative staff.
She said she managed absenteeism and that the pattern, especially among warehouse workers and administrative staff, was that people did not want to take sick leave for common illness. She said the reason was not exceptional loyalty to the company but a financial calculation workers made whenever a symptom appeared, since they knew what it meant for their pay.
Two reasons behind the fear
According to Nerea, the decision to show up while sick rested on two factors. The first was the loss of income that comes with sick leave for common conditions. The second, and perhaps more revealing, was fear that an absence would raise a red flag in performance evaluations.
She said employees felt that any day missed from work could be interpreted as a lack of commitment and used against them, a pressure that pushed them to prioritize showing up over their own health.
Managers face a different standard
Nerea described a contrast that she said shaped the company's daily management. While base-level workers felt obliged to justify every illness to their family doctor, managers operated under different rules.
She said that, in a much more irresponsible way, department heads and executives had no need to see a doctor to explain why they had a headache and did not show up to work that day.
She closed her appearance by saying managers are forgiven, but workers are not.
