Long-term sick leave and rehabilitation
When an employee is on sick leave, we want to make it as easy as possible for the person to return to work. This page is intended as a support for managers and employees who need to handle rehabilitation, and for the safety representatives and union representatives involved.
Get started early
In order for the rehabilitation to achieve a good result, it is important to get started as early as possible. Hold an early dialogue about which tasks could be relevant when sick leave is no longer full-time. The purpose is to give you as an employee an idea of the workload and thereby reduce uncertainty, but also so that you as a manager can plan as best you can.
Agree on how contact with the workplace can be maintained during sick leave. It should be regular and reasonably frequent, so that you do not feel that you lose contact with the work but at the same time do not have a forced contact. Both the manager and the employee should take their share of the responsibility for keeping in touch, but the ultimate responsibility of course lies with the manager. When the employee feel well enough, it is a good idea to participate in social activities such as fika, even during the sick leave.
A plan for returning to work, a rehabilitation plan, may need to be developed. It can be very helpful to also make an appendix to the rehabilitation plan that is more concrete in which tasks and contact persons are relevant. The appendix can also be used after the sick leave is completed.
Read more about rehabilitation at KHT and how to make an rehabilitation plan.
Our goal at CBH
At the CBH School, we want our employees on sick leave to be able to return to work and do the tasks that are possible, based on the conditions of the individual and the workplace.
There must be a contact person for the employee. It is important that the contact person can be available and provide support to the returning person. Our recommendation is to primarily choose a colleague for this role. An alternative, it is that the manager is the contact person. Get the support of HR and safety representatives in this step when needed.
First day back at work:
- Review which tasks are relevant in the near future.
- Announce which contact persons are relevant for different questions.
- Create a permissive environment, where it is possible to dare to prove vulnerable. This means, among other things, a tolerance for the employee to have to handle the work in a different way in the beginning, without any negative consequences.
After a week at work, the contact person holds a follow-up:
- How has the first week been?
- Any suggestions to the manager on adjustments in work tasks - based on how it has gone so far.
If relevant, the same follow-up can be done several times. Especially in the event of changes in sick leave, for example when the employee starts working 50% instead of 25%
Managing severe stress reactions
At the CBH School, we want to be better at helping people who have had severe stress reactions. Therefore, we have enlisted the help of the Social Partners’ Council (Partsrådet), which has held training for managers, HR, safety representatives and union representatives. The Social Partners’ Council is a non-profit organization consisting of employers and unions at the central level within the state. They work to ensure that the public sector has the best workplace environments.
Read more about the Social Partners’ Council
The Social Partners’ Council’s education "Welcome back" is completely evidence-based and we reproduce parts of it here.
Early return
Early focus on returning to work is good - research shows that the best support for returning to work after a severe stress reaction is to have contact with the immediate manager and to talk early about what the workload may look like when the employee returns.
It is positive to start working before the symptoms have completely subsided. In the case of mild to moderate problems, most people can work part-time if they receive support and an adapted work situation. Then the sick leave needs to be reduced gradually, instead of the employee starting working full time immediately. The purpose is for all employees to be able to work and enjoy themselves. KTH benefits greatly from our expertise, even if it is part-time.
We know that it is challenging to return to the same position with new conditions. For example, a researcher is often the sole specialist in his or her field, a teacher often works individually and one who has personnel responsibilities may find it difficult to prioritize and change their work during the period needed. Therefore, it is important to get the right help early - at CBH there is an HR person with a work environment focus and at the occupational health service, there is a rehab coordinator available. Safety representatives should also be involved in the rehabilitation process, and union representatives can be a support. The immediate superior is responsible for the rehabilitation, but is not alone in this situation.
Safety representatives at the CBH School
Combined efforts are the key
Efforts are required both for the employee and for the workplace for the rehabilitation to be successful. For example, there may be something called a rehabilitation plan for caregivers, and it is then focused on the individual. There is still a need for a plan from the employer for return to work, a rehabilitation plan, at the workplace.
What can we do, more specifically, in the workplace? It is about creating a balance between requirements and resources, which can be different for different roles and people. Examples of requirements are unclear expectations of work effort, threats and violence risks, requirements generated by complex IT systems, large workload, and constant changes. Examples of resources are support from managers, support from colleagues, sufficient knowledge, sufficient technical aids, and sufficient time.
The rehabilitation after a severe stress reaction consists at best of three consecutive phases, and the concrete measures are different for each phase.
Recover – rest and stay in touch