Moldbuilders Discussion Forum

We have a pretty complex attendance policy that includes point system for missing work, leaving early, begin tardy, etc. If you accumulate a certain number of points it results in disciplinary action. It's hard to administer and even harder to enforce. I'm looking for something system. If anyone a policy they can share I would appreciate it. thank you.

Hi Michael,

We don't have a real specific policy on attendance. We are scheduled for 44 hours a week but at a minimum require 40. We start at 7 and end at 4:30. There are some variations with 2nd shift, etc. Some always work 40, some always work 48. Many, many years ago it was much more strict but as younger employees began having families it did not work. We just ask for open communication, work with the supervisor and most importantly make our deliveries. It's OK if they need to leave for a couple hours here or there for family related stuff, etc. but over 4 hours requires PTO. Our employees do a great job of balancing their hours based on deliveries and the work they have in front of them. It is a culture, it takes time and it takes trust and it has to be a 2 way street with give and take.

Hi Michael,

We don't have a defined policy either--but I can share what we do.

My experience has been that policy doesn't drive behaviors as much as our culture does and culture is always made up of 2 primary things:
1) What you allow
2) What you create

For us, we hold everyone accountable to start by 7AM or before in the morning. End times are flexible based on workload or if the team members need flexibility for a specific reason. We have weekly meetings where we share expectations for the week. When someone isn't pulling their weight or has a tardiness problem, then a side conversation to hold them accountable has been effective to change the behavior. Having these conversations isn't fun and I don't get excited about having them---but it is a necessary function of leadership to hold our people accountable and everyone from time to time needs course corrections.

Hope this helps
-Tyler VanRee

Hi Micheal.

Just saw this. We also don't have a complicated policy. We try to be as flexible as possible. We communicate the expected hours per week and expect everybody to be here by 7:30 for day shift. When someone proves to be consistently out of line we have a meeting with them privately. I will at times graph each guys habits and use it as a conversation piece during performance reviews. Both positive and negative. We have a lot of younger guys and they value the flexibility. Most of them rate it right up towards the top in why they enjoy working here. When working on a team that needs everybody to be there at the same time we let the team know that and peer pressure does it's job usually.

Hope this helps.

Larry Patten
Dramco Tool

We do not have a hard and fast policy. We understand that different people have different time needs based on family obligations and other things. What we require is 40 hours a week. Some of our team starts as early as 5am, others at 6:30, then they leave between 2-4. Our laser welding department is a bit more formalized. They are typically 7am-5pm.

With the flexibility we haven't really run into an issue of people abusing it.

Hope this helps.