India Inc. may register a significant drop in productivity during the month of November 2012 as one in five employees plans to take off or reduce working hours during Diwali pre or post celebration, according to a random survey.
The Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India’s (ASSOCHAM) survey on “Productivity Slump During Diwali week” reveals that the impact of the Diwali festivals will hurt the industrial output by 25% because fewer employees are available for work during the Diwali month and the productivity has come down from 8 hours to 4 hours during the festive week.
“The festive season has traditionally been a lean period for industrial production, in almost every year, the IIP growth in Diwali month has been lower than the overall growth for the year”, D S Rawat Secretary General, ASSOCHAM said while releasing the ASSOCHAM survey.
For businesses, this could translate into several thousands of man-hours of lost productivity. As per ASSOCHAM rough estimates, between 500,000 to 800,000 people will take off during Diwali and result in a productivity loss of 400 lakhs man hours (5 lakhs x 8 hours x 10 days) during the month of November.
The actual level of absenteeism is likely to be even higher, due to pre/post celebrations of festivals, reveals the survey. The productivity slump from November is going to continue till mid - November, the survey said.
The survey further indicates that nearly 20% to 35% of employee will take off from their work during the festive week in the month of November.
Around 55% of the survey respondents fall under the age bracket of 20-29 years, followed by 30-39 years (26%), 40-49 years (16%), 50-59 years (2%) and 60-69 years (approximately 1%).
The survey was conducted in major cities like Delhi-NCR, Mumbai, Bangalore, Kolkata, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Pune, Chandigarh, and Dehradun etc. A little over 200 employee were selected from each city on an average.
The survey was able to target corporate employees from 18 broad sectors, with maximum share contributed by employees from IT/ITes and BPO sector (17%).
Employees working in engineering and telecom sector contributed 9% and 8% respectively in the questionnaire. Nearly 6% of the employees belonged from market research/KPO and media background each. Management, FMCG and Infrastructure sector employees share is 5% each, in the total survey. Respondents from power and real estate sector contributed 4% each. Employees from education and food& beverages sector provided a share of 3% each. Advertising, manufacturing and textiles employees offered a share of 2% each in the survey results.
It is found that 60% of respondents indicated their intention to take at least 7-10 days off from work. Just over half of the respondents said they intended to work shorter days (nearly 3 to 4 hours for work), with the rest indicating that they planned either to request days off using their annual leave, or simply call in sick.
“Workplace productivity in India is expected to drop over the festive seasons, with several festivals like Dhanteras, BhaiDuj, Diwali, Chath and others. Workplace productivity is bound to be affected and employers should be concerned about the issue of employee absenteeism and the resulting productivity loss,” revealed the ASSOCHAM survey.
About 86% of the CEO mentioned that the companies will have a tough time dealing with their employees during such days. Most of the staff, even the managers will be off from their works.
