151 Quick Ideas to Deal With Difficult People

125Flu Rage

Employees who come to work sick are often misguided. “Tenacious” and “dedicated” is how they might describe their efforts. Increasingly though, their colleague and others would use quite different terms. Economists call this dogged persistence “presenteeism,” and it costs companies bundles in productivity losses.

On-the-job productivity losses from presenteeism account for as much as 60 percent of employers’ total costs related to workers’ illnesses, according to a joint study by Cornell University and the health-information firm Medstat.

Sometimes colleagues drag themselves in because they’ve exhausted their sick days or the company didn’t offer the benefit in the first place. Still, politely suggest to sick colleagues that they ...