No more notes

There are some changes in the workplace that make you think: “Well, it’s about time.”

This is one of them.

Starting Oct. 1, Manitoba changed the rules around sick notes. I think it is going to be a wonderful change — not just for doctors and patients, but for employers, employees and the way we think about accountability at work.

The change comes from Bill 11, the Employment Standards Code Amendment Act (Sick Notes for Employee Absences), which received royal assent on June 1 and came into force Thursday. Under the new rules, employers generally cannot require a sick note for an illness or injury unless the employee is away for more than one week or has been absent because of illness or injury for more than 10 scheduled workdays in the calendar year.

And before anyone panics: this does not mean employers have lost the ability to manage attendance, deal with extended absences or ask for appropriate medical information when it is needed. There are still circumstances where medical documentation can be required, including certain leaves and documentation confirming an employee is fit to return to work.

What is changing is the expectation that someone who has been home for a day or two with the flu, a migraine, stomach bug or some other short-term illness needs to make an appointment with a health-care professional simply to prove that they were sick.

And that is a very good thing.

I was fortunate to be asked by Doctors Manitoba to help develop a toolkit for employers as part of their work to reduce the administrative burden on physicians. This has been a fascinating project because it sits at the intersection of health care and human resources — two areas that, surprisingly often, end up trying to solve each other’s problems.

The problem with sick notes is pretty simple.

If I am an employee and I call my employer and say, “I am sick today,” my employer has an HR issue: I am absent from work. But somehow, for years, we have routinely turned that into a medical issue.

The employee goes to a doctor. The doctor assesses them or sometimes sees them after the illness has already passed and provides a piece of paper confirming that the person was, indeed, sick.

That takes time.

Doctors Manitoba estimates more than 600,000 sick notes are requested in Manitoba every year. Its research found eliminating sick notes could free up more than 300,000 health-care visits annually — the equivalent of adding more than 50 doctors to the system.

In a health-care system where people are waiting for appointments, physicians are stretched and we are constantly talking about access to care, we have been asking doctors to spend precious time verifying that an employee was too sick to come to work. That doesn’t make much sense.

There is another reason I love this change: the opportunity it creates for better accountability in the workplace.

There is sometimes an assumption if we don’t require a doctor’s note, we are somehow being less rigorous with employees. I think the opposite can be true.

If an employee tells their employer they are sick, we should be able to have a professional conversation about that absence without automatically bringing a third party into it.

An employer’s responsibility is to manage the workplace. An employee’s responsibility is to be honest about their attendance. That is a relationship.

A doctor doesn’t need to be the referee.

If someone calls in sick on Monday, the conversation can simply be: “Thanks for letting us know. Take care of yourself and let us know when you expect to be back.”

If someone is away repeatedly, that is a different conversation. The employer can look at attendance patterns, talk to the employee, understand what is happening and determine what support or management is appropriate.

And if the situation becomes more complicated — an extended absence, accommodation issue, return-to-work question or something that genuinely requires medical expertise — then, absolutely, involve the appropriate health-care professional.

The point isn’t doctors don’t have an important role in the workplace. The point is they shouldn’t have to be involved when their expertise isn’t needed.

The employer toolkit developed by Doctors Manitoba in partnership with HR professionals gives employers practical tools to actually make the transition.

There is a sick leave policy template employers can adopt, self-attestation form employees can use to confirm an illness without seeing a doctor and an absence management flow chart to help managers figure out what to do when an employee is away. There is also guidance on employee engagement and communication, a workplace poster and an employee health and wellness tip sheet. In other words, the toolkit helps employers replace the old system with something better.

That is the most important part of this entire initiative. We aren’t just eliminating something, we are replacing it with trust, communication and appropriate accountability.

That doesn’t mean employers should ignore attendance problems. It doesn’t mean employees can simply disappear whenever they feel like it. And it certainly doesn’t mean that medical information will never be necessary in the workplace.

It means we can distinguish between a simple short-term absence and a situation that actually requires medical expertise. There is something wonderfully refreshing about that.

We don’t send an employee to a doctor because they forgot to follow a workplace procedure. We don’t send an employee to a doctor because they are chronically late. We don’t send an employee to a doctor because they have a performance issue.

Those are HR issues.

So why have we been sending HR issues like short-term attendance verification to doctors?

This change gives us permission to stop. And, perhaps best of all, it gives employers an opportunity to have better conversations with their employees.

“Are you OK?”

“When do you expect to return?”

“Is there anything you need from us?”

“Let’s talk about your attendance.”

Those are workplace conversations. They don’t require a medical certificate to have them. That is a win for everybody.

Doctors get more time to treat patients. Patients don’t have to take up appointments simply to obtain paperwork. Employees don’t have to spend time and money obtaining unnecessary documentation. And employers get to manage attendance directly, rather than outsourcing a basic workplace accountability question to the health-care system.

If you’re an employer or HR professional and you’re wondering what you need to do, don’t panic, download the toolkit.

Start by reviewing your sick-leave policies, employee handbooks and employment documents. Make sure managers understand the new rules, decide how you want employees to report short-term absences and communicate the change clearly.

Doctors Manitoba has made the resources available free of charge at DoctorsNotes.ca, with practical templates and guidance to help workplaces make the transition.

Sometimes, reducing the burden on the health-care system isn’t about building something new. Sometimes, it’s about recognizing that something we have always done simply doesn’t need to be done anymore. And sometimes, the best way to make workplaces healthier is to trust each other a little more.

Tory McNally, CPHR, BSc., vice-president, professional services at TIPI Legacy HR+ (formerly Legacy Bowes), is a human resource consultant, relationship builder and problem solver. She can be reached at tmcnally@tipipartners.com