Modeling Dynamics of Workforce Absenteeism and Effectiveness of Mitigation Actions during Pandemics

A pandemic is likely to occur in the near future, and it could cause significant disruptions in society creating deaths, despair, fear, and monetary cost, among other losses. Firms would also be negatively affected by a pandemic through loss of revenue, profit, employees, and even through a reduction in the value of the business itself. Especially for service-intensive businesses, employee absenteeism is a key factor that impacts firms when a pandemic occurs, hampering various business operations. In this paper, we describe a system dynamics model that describes dynamics of workforce absenteeism resulting from a pandemic, and also effectiveness of corporate mitigation actions.

By: Young M. Lee; Lianjun An

Published in: RC24225 in 2007

LIMITED DISTRIBUTION NOTICE:

This Research Report is available. This report has been submitted for publication outside of IBM and will probably be copyrighted if accepted for publication. It has been issued as a Research Report for early dissemination of its contents. In view of the transfer of copyright to the outside publisher, its distribution outside of IBM prior to publication should be limited to peer communications and specific requests. After outside publication, requests should be filled only by reprints or legally obtained copies of the article (e.g., payment of royalties). I have read and understand this notice and am a member of the scientific community outside or inside of IBM seeking a single copy only.

rc24225.pdf

Questions about this service can be mailed to reports@us.ibm.com .