Some things just go together, like peanut butter and jelly, locks and keys, and peas in a pod. So why wouldn’t you in incorporate workplace wellness initiatives into ergonomics and safety programs? They should fit together like pieces of a puzzle to produce a clear picture of healthy, productive and safe employees.
Workplace wellness programs focus on improving the overall health and well-being of the worker. The current understanding is that health and wellness is an active process and provides an opportunity to build and enhance a company’s employee population. It is a proactive, preventative approach designed to promote habits and behaviors to achieve optimum levels of health, social and emotional functioning. Wellness programs provide education for employees so that they make the right choices to lead a healthy lifestyle. This can include coaching, weight and stress management programs, and education on nutrition, fitness and other risky behaviors such as alcohol, drugs and smoking. The goals for employers who invest in a wellness program are to lower expenses related to absenteeism and health care costs and to improve the wellbeing and job satisfaction of their employees.
Ergonomics programs focus on the optimizing the people and processes or an organization. The purpose of ergonomics is to improve the well-being of the employees and overall system performance. (IEA, 2000). Ergonomics is focused on how the employees interact and interface with their work—the environment, work flow, task and the equipment/products they use to perform the tasks. Ergonomics programs seek to identify and implement sustainable, effective and proactive solutions in productivity, efficiency and injury prevention. The bottom line value of ergonomics is increased process efficiency, improved employee productivity and safety. The results are increased revenues, more engaged employees and lower workers compensation costs.
Protection and Promotion
A recent paper, “Workplace Health Protection and Promotion: A New Pathway for A Healthier – and Safer – Workforce,” written by the task force the American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine (ACOEM) and published in JOEM, suggests that employers can gain a more powerful punch from their wellness programs if they are integrated into other safety and health initiatives. Many companies isolate their ergonomics/safety programs from their wellness programs into different “silos”. The researchers said that this approach is a common mistake made by employers and in doing so, the effectiveness of each program suffers.
The paper contends that the concept of “workplace health protection and promotion” can address this divided approach by systematically integrating these two programs, therefore increasing the overall health and well-being of the workforce while decreasing the likelihood of workplace injuries and illnesses. The authors state, “both health protection and health promotion interventions are best achieved when they are working in concert.”
The paper defines “health protection” as incorporating the activities that protect workers from occupational injury and illness – ranging from basic safety training, protective gear, work organization, and safety enhancing modifications to equipment. “Health promotion,” by contrast, is defined as including activities that maintain or improve the personal health of a work force – ranging from health-risk assessments to wellness initiatives and immunizations.
“The two factors, personal health and personal safety – each essential to a productive worker and to a productive workplace – are effectively combined in a symbiotic manner way that increases their impact on overall health and productivity. The whole becomes greater than the sum of its parts. Stated simply, workplace health protection and promotion is the strategic and systematic integration of distinct environmental, health, and safety policies and programs into a continuum of activities that enhances the overall health and well-being of the workforce and prevents work-related injuries and illnesses,” the authors stated.
Ergonomics, safety, health and wellness—all benefit the employees and the employer. They may appear to be different approaches; however, they share a common goal: promoting overall health and preventing workplace injuries. We all know that the greatest asset of every company is their employees—their people. People make productivity happen and they make the bottom line. Implementing and sustaining both programs together will result in positive impacts to both the company and the employees.
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