Take a break when you don't feel well

Have you ever gone to work when you needed to stay at home in bed? Or have you forced yourself out of bed in the morning and barely made it to your meeting that day, even though you couldn't lift your arm? Have you ever set off for work with a migraine, your throat too swollen to speak, your nose too stuffy to breathe, your head too scattered to handle the slightest sound; in short, when neither your body nor your mind was too exhausted to make it through a working day?

Your answers are yes, aren't they? Perhaps it is a bleeding wound for many of us: Going to work when sick. Well, do you know that this situation has come to life with a concept in the literature and is experienced by many people?

If you feel the need to be constantly available and productive, you may have fallen into the grip of 'presenteeism' at least once during your working life. Nowadays, there is so much emphasis on productivity and success that everyone who works tries to exert great effort to excel at their job or to look perfect, and puts their health on the back burner. And what is the result? As many of us have experienced, increased stress, burnout, deteriorating mental health, loss of motivation, perhaps symptoms of depression.

It describes a situation where someone goes to work when they are sick and know they cannot focus, and the resulting poor performance and productivity. It's a very familiar scenario, isn't it? If you're one of those people who say, "I'm so sick, I don't feel like it, but I go to work anyway," you might actually have a few dominant ideas about why you do it; and probably many people do too.

According to scientific research and survey results, many people around the world continue to be present at work no matter how sick they feel, either because they think it will tarnish their excellent image at work or because they fear that they might be fired if they are absent. Considering today's conditions, especially during the pandemic, the increase in unemployment due to the fact that many employers tried to reduce the company's losses by reducing the number of employees was a great concern for everyone.

For this reason, no matter how sick they felt, many people did not take time off work and continued to work and still do. As economic crises are felt more intensely around the world day by day, the fear of losing one's job and salary intertwines with the fear of losing one's job and salary, and health takes a back seat.

Let's squeeze a small anecdote and smile a little bit about this not-so-optimistic subject: European Side fans will remember that I am actually busy! When we go to work when we are sick, don't we all feel like saying something like that. How can it benefit anyone to be physically present at work when we are feeling bad, struggling with health problems, when our energy is at rock bottom; even if we are there, we don't really exist...

Working in such a situation is not only physically and mentally damaging for the individual, but it is also not in the best interests of companies. Because as we can all guess, it is almost impossible to get efficiency from someone who is sick, exhausted, weak, tired; moreover, it is unfair to expect efficiency. Even if a sick person is physically present at the workplace, he or she cannot be there mentally and spiritually; what good would it be for him or her to make a presentation, prepare a report or attend a meeting when all he or she wants to do is go home and lie down.

Many studies suggest the concept of 'unseen costs' - the cost of not being present at work. When employees go to work sick, it can cause a loss of around 35 billion dollars a year because it leads to a decline in their performance at work, including lost time. In addition, given the risk of a sick employee spreading their illness in the workplace, more employees are likely to suffer from poor performance than just one person.