Employers Urged to Address Leave Liability

Tourism Australia's No Leave No Life website features an employer resources toolkit with a series of modules and practical case studies to assist with implementing a successful annual leave program. Key focus areas outlined include:

•  Identifying challenges facing management such as pressure to meet targets, lack of reporting, competing priorities
•  Recognising the barriers to leave-taking and prioritising leave-taking policy in the workplace
•  Integrating leave-planning into current processes to ensure adequate coverage
•  Engaging employees - CEO, management and HR commitment is critical to success
•  How to set objectives and review regularly
•  Considerations to keep in mind when encouraging leave - compromise with employees on leave-taking within the context of your plan to ensure acceptable outcomes for employees and management
•  Developing a holiday-planning checklist to help staff better manage their departure from and return to work
•  Points to help managers look at how to measure the success of their annual leave policy

Often there are deep-seated reasons employees continue to not take annual leave - from economic and job security concerns, through to apprehensions about the workload they'll face upon return to work if their position is not backfilled while they are away. "Employees who don't take annual leave can often display higher levels of depression or anxiety-related stress among other symptoms compared to those who do take holidays," Medibank Health Solutions director Dr Peter Cotton said. "Even taking short breaks for just a few days can lead to an improvement in a person's mental, emotional and physical wellbeing."

For more information and access to the employer resources and tools page visit noleavenolife.com/employer/

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