INTRODUCTION: Globalization, nature of job, travel restrictions, work location, disease outbreaks (eg covid-19) are some of the factors that can lead to why an employee could stay away from home for long.
The following are some of the possible impacts that long stay away from home can have on an employee.
- SOCIAL IMPACT: come to think of it, imagine that employee who has a favourite drinking spot, sports centre, that party freak or that shopaholic who is tied to a place far from home for a long time. Think about how this can affect their social life.
- LOSS OF APPETITE: This is a big challenge when it comes to staying away from home for a long time because of work. I have seen employees complain about being tired of eating available food because they probably miss their favourite food or just want to eat food from their homes. Remember, once your mental health is disturbed for food, you definitely would lose appetite. This is just to let you know that loss of appetite is not always a disease condition.
- INABILITY TO ATTEND WORSHIP CENTRES: There’re psychological effects of not being able to attend one’s worship centre for long or being unable to meet with one’s brotherhood. This could be church, mosque, shrine or cult meetings.
- SEXUAL IMPACT: This is an important factor many people shy away from talking about. The truth is that there is a desire for sex at one point or the other when one stays away from home for long. This is applicable to both married and single employees except a few. Take note, while regular sexual intercourse could be rewarding for some people, abstinence could be rewarding for others. It is all about individual choice.
- LOSS OF INTEREST: doing the same thing repeatedly has a way of making some people lose interest in such activity. Long stay at work, doing the same thing for too long could lead to this.
- POOR ADHERENCE TO MEDICATIONS: Staying away from home for long have a way of making some employees with chronic medical condition (s) lose interest in taking their medications or adhere to their medications. A good example is an employee whose spouse always follows up on his or her medication and now staying away for long.
- DEPRESSION: Depression could set in if the above problems are neglected or not taking care of. My job has to allow me to talk to people of diverse backgrounds and I have realized that when you come close to people and show concern about them, you would be shocked by how many people are going through depression around you.
- POOR PERFORMANCE AT WORK: This is the result of the above challenges. There are negative economic Implications of this particular challenge on the employer/ organization.
SUMMARY: Yes, sales (profit) is a priority in business but employees welfare is a major determinant of their productivity and organization profitability.
