Trading floor TVs, atrium games help prevent soccer sick notes

Kellogg Co doesn’t have to worry about staff at its UK headquarters staying away from work or sneaking out of the office when England plays its potentially decisive World Cup game against Slovenia next week.

When the match kicks off at 3 pm local time on June 23, the 660 employees at Kellogg’s base in Manchester, northwest England, will be allowed into the building atrium to watch the team’s attempt to qualify for the tournament’s latter stages.

“It’s fantastic that we are being able to watch it from work,” said Louise Davies, assistant communications manager for the cereal maker. “It’s hard to imagine that with a big crowd, employees won’t want to join in to watch the match,” he added.

With many World Cup games taking place during working hours, European companies must decide whether to make provisions for staff wanting to follow their team. Those that don’t risk absenteeism or clogged Internet networks as workers log on to live streams of the games. The cost to UK businesses in terms of lost working hours may reach £1 billion ($1.48 billion), according to the Chartered Management Institute.

Fiat SpA, Italy’s biggest carmaker, can get as many as 500 medical notes from employees on the day of an important soccer match, according to two people familiar with the matter.

Credit Suisse Group AG’s office in London has a small auditorium available to allow its employees to watch certain games of the World Cup and has screens in the background across dealing rooms. It’s raising money for the Alzheimers Society by selling flags to employees supporting their individual teams.

“There is huge goodwill, both in terms of employee engagement and in productivity, to be gained from accommodating flexible working requests or allowing staff to take a couple of hours out to watch the games,” said Michael Rendell, leader of human resource services at PricewaterhouseCoopers.

According to a survey conducted in April by YouGov and Telegent Systems, 38 percent of employees in England would be prepared to skip work to watch the soccer.