Due to excessive competition in the workplace, many employees feel the need to go to work even when they are sick - a phenomenon known as "presenteeism". At the same time, however, a third of US workers admitted taking a sick day even when they were fine. Whether you're really sick or just need a day off, following these tips to figure out when and how to call will help you avoid upsetting - and infecting - your boss and co-workers.
Steps
Method 1 of 3: Finding Out If You Are Sick and Should Stay Home
Step 1. Think about your colleagues
Even if you're not on good terms with everyone, you shouldn't get to the point of wanting to make a coworker sick. If nothing else, think about the difficulties you would face if half of your office was sick and absent, because of you.
- Stay home if you are contagious. If you cough, sneeze, runny nose, or have an open wound, don't go to work. What do you think when you are healthy and the colleague next to you coughs all day and sneezes on the copier?
- Don't confuse cold symptoms with seasonal allergies, which aren't contagious and (under normal conditions) don't require sick days. Both conditions cause nasal congestion or sneezing, but allergies shouldn't cause fever or widespread pain. Talk to your doctor if you feel like you always have a cold at the same time of the year. it could be allergy.
- Pay particular attention to coworkers who are at increased risk of illness or infection. Colleagues who are pregnant, immunosuppressed or facing cancer treatments are more vulnerable to disease and can suffer from serious complications.
- Don't feel guilty because everyone will have to work harder due to your absence. You're doing your co-workers a favor by keeping the germs at home.
Step 2. Assess your potential effectiveness
If you can't stand, see clearly, stay awake, or stay 10 minutes without going to the bathroom, you won't be very helpful at work.
- Your boss might not like it when you take a sick day, but they wouldn't like it if you were useless all day. You better be productive when you are present and absent when you are unproductive.
- That said, if you gave yourself sick every time you weren't 100%, you'd practically never go to work. Try to determine if you are able to perform sufficiently, even if not exceptionally.
Step 3. Evaluate your options
Today, many people do much of their work from home or can do it as needed. Think about whether one day you work from home may be enough or whether you need not work at all.
- If your duties permit, offer to work from home if you are contagious but not out of action.
- Don't ask to work from home if you are too sick to work. In these cases, it is very important to rest, in order to heal well.
- If you are afraid of calling yourself sick, or doing it without offering to work from home, due to pressure from your supervisor, find ways to support more tolerant sick day policies in your workplace. Talk to your colleagues and create a united front that supports how paid sick days can improve productivity and morale.
Step 4. Prepare for a sick day before it arrives
If you work as part of a "team" or are a supervisor, you may have more doubts about when to take a sick day for fear of interfering with everyone's work.
- If you start feeling sick and suspect that you will need to stay home the next day, make a list of activities that your co-workers or subordinates can do in your absence. Display it prominently on your desk so that it will be easy to find the following day.
- More generally, it's a good idea to have a "to do in your absence" list ready. You can guide your colleagues even when you are not at work.
Method 2 of 3: Follow the Label
Step 1. Assess your boss's reaction to sick days
Does he go into a rage if an employee goes ill and is not about to die? Do you find the staff who report the news by message or e-mail disrespectful and not by phone? Use this information to understand when and how to give yourself sick.
- The fear of angering the boss is one of the reasons why the average American employee only asks for five sick days a year, despite getting eight or nine.
- At best, you'll be less afraid if your boss reacts sensibly to legitimate requests for sick days.
- In the worst case scenario, you will find that you will have to push hard to get a sick day, even when you really need it.
Step 2. Assume that you need to call yourself sick
If you're lucky, your boss will just need a text or email (you'll find examples later in the guide). More likely, though, you'll need to have a real conversation on the phone.
- In almost all cases, calling to call you sick makes your request more respectful, serious, and legitimate.
- It is important to call at the right time. Don't call too early - you might wake up your boss, or look like you haven't even tried to go to work. Calling too late, on the other hand, could be considered disrespectful, for putting everyone in trouble with your last-minute absence.
- The best time to call is between the time you wake up and the time you leave for work. The message you will send will be the following: "I tried, but today there is nothing to be done".
Step 3. Don't overdo it
Your boss will want to make sure you're really sick, but he doesn't need the gory details of your morning grocery shopping folded over the toilet. Explain clearly, directly and briefly why you need to stay at home.
- By knowing your boss and his reaction to sick day requests, you will know how much detail you will need to provide about symptoms and your condition.
- If you're unsure whether you're a great actor on the phone, faking or exaggerating symptoms to impress your boss isn't a good idea. You would only arouse suspicion if your "hoarse voice" or "persistent cough" sounded fake, even on occasions when you really do have those symptoms, but in a milder form.
- Apologize for the inconvenience, but don't feel guilty if you're really sick. Remember, you're doing everyone a favor.
Step 4. Behave when you get back to work
You won't have to disclose explicit details about your health, or point out your remaining symptoms as evidence of why you stayed home. Also avoid giving the impression that you have never been better, though. Instead, you should be slightly more courteous than usual.
- Appreciate the efforts made by your colleagues to make up for your absence, and apologize for any problems you have caused.
- It also demonstrates that you care about your colleagues' health by taking maximum care of your hygiene when you return to the office. Wash your hands as if you were a surgeon before operating and use the disinfectant you keep on your desk until the bottle is empty. Declare war on the risk of contagion.
Method 3 of 3: Pretending to be Sick
Step 1. Choose the right day to pretend to be sick
If you have decided to take a sick day, check the calendar first, to make sure the day you choose doesn't seem like the perfect one to stay at home. Here are some tips for choosing the right day:
- If you choose Friday or Monday, you will have to be very convincing, because you will give the impression that you want to spend a three day weekend.
- Make sure you haven't taken too many sick days recently, even if they were real ailments - you don't want to look like the person who's always trying to stay home from work. Only pretend to be sick if you've been to work all the time for the past two months.
- Don't pick a particularly important or hard day, like a meeting day that everyone dreads, or when a client who everyone knows doesn't get along with you will show up. Your attempt to try to avoid work would be obvious.
- Don't pick a day when a major sporting event will take place. If everyone knows that you are a fan of a team and that you are dying to go to a game, your apology will not be credible.
- Don't choose Monday after a party or event that took place on Sunday. Everyone will have the impression that you stayed home for personal reasons and not because you are sick.
Step 2. Start showing signs of indisposition the day before you go home
When you have chosen the day off, you should give warning signs of your illness the previous day. It would be suspicious if you gave yourself sick after a day of working hard or enjoying your coffee break. That said, making your upcoming illness too obvious would be a clear sign of your dishonesty, so remember not to overdo it.
- Cough or sniffle from time to time.
- At lunch, say naturally that you are not hungry.
- Keep a slightly unkempt appearance. If you are a man, either ruffle your hair or don't completely tuck your shirt into your pants. If you are a woman, wear less makeup than usual and don't wash your hair, to look tired. Don't overdo it - remember that you want to give the impression that you are sick, not sloppy.
- Don't make your illness too obvious. When people hear you coughing, they will ask you how you feel. Try to ignore it. Reply: "No, really, I'm fine" or "I'm just a little tired".
- If you always drink coffee, choose to drink tea.
- Keep your hands on your head as if it hurts you.
- Take a pain reliever during the day. Carry a bottle full of pills for everyone to hear when you take them out of your pocket. You can pretend to take the pill, but you have to be convincing.
- Be more reserved. Don't try to be too friendly to everyone.
- If your coworkers invite you to have a drink or eat at a restaurant for lunch, thank them, but tell them you don't want to.
- If it's Friday, and you intend to stay home the following Monday, say that you don't feel well at the end of the day, but that after the weekend you will be ready to go back to work. On Monday, then, you can tell how bad you felt over the weekend and that you are recovering, but that you are still recovering.
Step 3. Prepare for the call
After starting the "Operation Sick Day" at work, you should prepare for the phone call when you get home. Be prepared for all possibilities, so as not to be caught off guard.
- Learn the symptoms of your illness perfectly. Is it a migraine, a cold or another? Migraines and colds are great excuses. Do not choose diseases that are so complicated that they are difficult to describe, or diseases that require many days of recovery, such as food poisoning and bacterial infections.
- Learn about your illness, but don't give too many details. The phone call should be short and concise. Just answer your boss's questions.
- Be prepared for questions your boss might ask you to give the impression that you are being honest. Decide when you got sick, how you will feel the next day, and what you will do to recover.
- Test the conversation. You can even call a close friend to practice. You can write some sort of rehearsal script, but don't read a text when you're actually on the phone.
Step 4. Call and be persuasive
This is the moment of truth on your fake sick day. If your phone call is convincing, you will be free to stay at home. If you make mistakes, at best you will anger your boss and at worst you will get fired. Call at the right time and in the right way, to have a better chance of success.
- Call soon. You shouldn't wait too long. But don't call early enough to wake him up and annoy him. Choose the time you would normally wake up to go to work to give the impression that you have woken up and realize you are not well enough.
- Pretend sick during the phone call. Whether you have to leave a voice message or speak directly to your boss, it's important to give the impression that you are really sick. Follow these tips to look more believable:
- Cough or sniffle during the phone call. Don't overdo it, as it's very easy to notice a fake cough, but a few strategic coughs can be helpful.
- Keep a hoarse voice. You can cause this by screaming into a pillow to irritate your throat, or by not drinking before calling.
- You can also call while lying with your head down (to sound congested), but make sure you don't get distracted and don't forget what you need to say.
Step 5. When you return to work, show signs of indisposition
It would be suspicious if you showed up refreshed and happy. Instead, you should appear to feel better after a cold, but still show symptoms. Remember, in particular, to take care of hygiene, to attract everyone's sympathy.
- Not taking care of your appearance perfectly. Again, you don't have to look sloppy, just slightly scruffy.
- Be more reserved than normal.
- Blow your nose or cough from time to time.
- Apologize for staying home.
- Don't show up with a nice tan or a new dress. It would be obvious to everyone that you spent the day in the sun or shopping.
Advice
- Don't tell any coworkers that you lied, even if it is a close friend of yours: the news could reach your boss's ears, and you would end up in trouble.
- If you often call yourself sick, your boss will become wary, perhaps even towards your colleagues.
- Remember that staff and your superiors monitor employee absences, and their length, and note the frequency and patterns that repeat themselves.
- Don't go out too often on the day off and remember that you may get a tax visit. You can go to the supermarket in overalls, but if your boss or your co-workers saw you in great shape at happy hour, you'd have a big problem.
