5 Most Common Reasons Ergonomics (as well as others) Programs Fail: Part 3

Reason #2:  Failure to Tie Ergonomics Into the Mission and Strategic Initiatives of the Company

Why does your company exist?  What are the mission and value statements of your company? What are the strategic initiatives?  What’s important to your department or boss? It’s pretty safe to say that your company doesn’t exist solely for the purpose of ergonomics.  Even for companies that make or sell ergonomic products, their existence is based upon products that help solve problems that their customers experience.  I’m not a gambler, but if I were it would probably be a very safe bet that ergonomics isn’t mentioned in the mission and value statements.  It might be listed as a strategic initiative, but again I would venture to say that that is highly unlikely.

You may be wondering why I’m even asking these questions.  Well, for one thing systems (programs) aren’t initiated or sustained unless they are important to the company year after year.  For instance, a manufacturing company may list strategic initiatives that include improving the customer experience, reducing waste and defects, implementing lean manufacturing, and targeting a specific customer segment for sales growth.  If the company has high injury rates improving the health and safety of employees might be an initiative.  Remember, strategic initiatives are typically for a certain time period, usually one year, so if a program is started during this year we have to ask what happens to it next year when it’s off the list.

Have you ever heard the statement, “If it’s important to my boss, it’s important to me.”?  This is very true.  If something is important to your company then it will be important to your boss and therefore it will be important to you.  Everyone will be expected to work on and give extra attention to this initiative.  Most likely there probably has been a statement or two added to the job performance expectations and goals around this initiative.  So paying close attention to these initiatives and the performance goals are to vital knowing how best to frame your “program” to continue.

Ergonomics isn’t a “sexy” topic and probably isn’t consistently on too many companies top 10 list of things to accomplish in a given year.  However, even if it’s not listed specifically as a strategic initiative many times those initiatives do require some or a great level of ergonomics to be successful.  For instance, a company goal that is always there, even if not spelled out, is to improve the bottom line (profit margin), i.e. maximize revenues and minimize expenses.  Ergonomics affects the bottom line by focusing on methods of improving work flow, human productivity and efficiency while reducing errors, defects and injuries.  We know that but do the people who control the budget know that to be fact.  The challenge in sustaining ergonomics comes from the inability to change the perceptions and stereotypes of ergonomics as just a “cost” or an “employee perk”.

Conclusion:

The reason to tie ergonomics into the mission and strategic initiatives is one way to sustain the system.  One has to look at the strategic initiatives each year and determine how ergonomics can be a vital part to one or more of them.  The CEOs/CFOs/Operations Managers of companies are not going to automatically think of ergonomics as an essential part of the process.  It’s our job as ergonomists to clearly show how and why it is.