wellness – Page 62 – SafetyAtWorkBlog

Workplace bullying possibly increasing

A United States report draws a parallel between increasingly difficult economic situations and an increase in workplace bullying. This video report is lightweight but is a recent airing of the issue with a different approach.

The angle taken in the story is that of a “pink elephant” that women are just as likely to bully their workmates as men are. Some of the speakers in the video try to relate female bullying to issues of female empowerment but bullying is more often a reflection of personal nastiness than a social movement.

Bullying received increased focus when workplace culture emerged but rather than a gender issue, our increasing intolerance for bullying is coming from a broader cultural movement than just through the workplace.

The video report originated through research undertaken by the Workplace Bullying Institute, an organisation that has existed for sometime and has very recently upgraded its website.

Kevin Jones

Passive smoking and casino workers

Smoke-free workplaces have gained considerable attention over the last few years but many countries allow exemptions for casinos. This makes no health sense but considerable political and revenue sense. The American Lung Association has released a video story about one non-smoking casino worker who has suffered lung cancer, Vinnie Rennich. (The 16meg flash video is available for download)

Groundwork for employee engagement

Safety professionals should be suspicious of many management trends. Over the last decade behavioural-based safety has been popular and more recently workplaces have been subjected to the application of amorphous concepts such as leadership and engagement. Many of these are dressing up old approaches to management in new jargon, some have little evidence to back up their claims.

At the end of April 2009 the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (SIOP) identified limits to the application of employee engagement. A SIOP statement said

Study after study has shown that an engaged workforce is considered desirable in any organization and leads to greater productivity and profitability. In short, There seems to be no downside to employee engagement. However, Thomas Britt, an industrial-organizational psychology professor at Clemson University, cautions there are some limits to employee engagement that managers should consider.

Britt acknowledges that employees who are actively involved in the management and decision-making of their company provide greater productivity and profitability. In modern parlance, engagement is good. But he identifies several issues that should be considered.

“If [engaged workers] are not getting the resources they feel they need to perform at their best, their engagement may be diminished.”

So worker enthusiasm and initiative needs to be adequately supported.

Britt said performance could be restricted by

lack of budget and equipment support,

access to important information,

work overload,

unclear objectives and goals, and

assigning employees’ tasks that don’t fit their training.

SIOP said

Britt’s research shows engaged employees are likely to become frustrated and dissatisfied and may blame their supervisors if they do not have the systems and support necessary to be effective. Given the higher pro-activity and energy levels of engaged employees, this frustration could lead to turnover as they begin to look for more supportive work environments. “The ones who stay behind may well be the ones who just don’t care,” said Britt.

Work overload can lead directly to burnout. According to SIOP, Britt said

“highly motivated employees are willing to go beyond the call of duty to help the organization, but when temporary overload continues and they repeatedly fail to meet their own high expectations, their motivation becomes directed at locating other job possibilities, leaving the organization at risk of losing key talent.”

The impediments to an engaged workforce can often be missed in the enthusiasm of the engagement evangelists It is important not to dismiss the enthusiasm but to temper it so that any benefits are long term. For any new management approaches to work, there must be adequate groundwork so that the participants know the reasons for change, this will help the new approach succeed.

In short, business needs to acknowledge that consultation is a basis for improvement not a communication method of telling people about change. As SafetyAtWorkBlog has said consultation occurs in preparation for change as well as during and after. Thomas Britt and SIOP have provided excellent ideas of the areas of threat for an employee engagement program.

More information may be available at www.siop.org.

Kevin Jones

Global pressures on Australian workers compensation schemes

Around 18 months ago the Victoria Government launched WorkHealth, a health prevention program that would be funded from the interest generated from the pool of workers compensation funds. SafetyAtWorkBlog has previously questioned how the program will be funded when its income source is likely to have been severely reduced due to the global economic problems.

On 1 April 2009 WorkCover in South Australia reported a half-year net loss of $313 million. WorkCover CEO Julia Davison said in a media release that

“the global crisis is, as expected, taking its toll. In the last six months stock markets have declined, investors have experienced significant losses, and interest rates have fallen significantly,” she said “Like all investors, WorkCover has been hit hard by the global financial downturn.”

Earlier in March 2009, the Chair of the WorkSafe Board Elana Rubin said

“the significant downturn on the world financial markets and reduction in interest rates had combined to drive a net loss of $1.42 billion for the half year. Whilst interest rate reductions are good news for those of us with mortgages, they have the opposite effect on our scheme – in the half year to 31 December 2008, the unprecedented level of interest rate cuts negatively impacted our net result by $645 million.”

On 1 April 2009 SafetyAtWorkBlog asked John Merritt why WorkHealth was not mentioned as part of his keynote presentation at the Safety In Action Conference. He reiterated the importance of the program in easing the recovery time, particularly, for manual handling injuries but acknowledged that the program’s funding source was based on interest

“from the [$600 million of the assets of the] workers compensation scheme over the next five years ….well there used to be interest from assets – there should be one day, there will be again – around $40 million each year for the next five years will be invested in worker health.”

It is good to hear that the WorkHealth program is going to continue but the fragility of the program’s funding should have been evident in the planning phase. Governments around the world are pulling back on government funded programs in a wide range of areas. Ideas that seem good in the good times are now looking like luxuries. It will be interesting to see if WorkHealth continues in the WorkCover area or moves to Health, where many of its critics have always said it belongs.

Kevin Jones

Mental Illness and Workplace Safety

Reports in the Australian media this week indicated that “nearly half the population has a common mental health problem at some point during their lives”. Safety professionals and HR practitioners should take note of these statistics and hope that it does not manifest in their shift, even though it is likely.

The difficulty with trying to manage or anticipate mental health issues is that they seem to have evolved over time and multiplied. There is the common phrase of “trying to herd cats” and it seems that mental health issues are the cats. One could apply lateral thinking and propose the solution is to get a dog but will the dog herd a cat that doesn’t look like a cat, smell like a cat, or worst scenario of all, a cat that resembles a dog!

Because of the fluctuating psychiatric states of everyone everyday how does one recognise when a mood swing becomes a mental health issue. Does one take everything as a mental health issue and waste time on frivolous matters? Or is there no such thing as a frivolous matter?

In the one article there are these confusing and inconsistent terms for mental health:

“common mental health problem”

“mental condition”

“non psychotic psychiatric problems”

“mood disorder”

“anxiety disorder”

“mental health disorder”

“substance abuse or dependency”

“mental disorder”

“mental illness”

“psychiatric condition”

In this report it is unlikely that the synonyms have been generated by the journalist as the data quoted is from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, but it indicates the confusion that safety professionals can feel when they need to accommodate more recent workplace hazards – the psychosocial hazards.

The list above does not include the “established” hazards of bullying, occupational violence or stress. The fact that there may be a clear differentiation between mental health symptoms and mental disorders but that needs to be clearly communicated to those who manage workplaces so that control resources can be allocated where best needed.

The article referred to above provides interesting statistics and there are gems of useful information in the ABS report but the article provides me with no clues about how to begin a coordinated program to address the mental health issues in the workplace. It is an article without hope, without clues, without pathways on which the professional can act.

There is no doubt the psychosocial hazards at work are real but the advocates of intervention need to clarify the message.

Kevin Jones

(This blog posting does not discuss the recent changes to compensation for defence personnel and soldiers for mental health from combat, but mental health in that “industry” is a fascinating comparison to what occurs in the private sector.)

Safety In Action Conference

For three days next week, SafetyAtWorkBlog will be reporting from the Safety In Action Conference in Melbourne. This is the 12th annual conference and it remains the dominant OHS conference on the Australian circuit for duration, affordability and credibility.

More information on the conference is available at www.siaconference.com.au. Check out the videos below on this page for an introduction to some of the speakers.

Contact me through my email if you are going to be at the conference and want to meet up.

Kevin Jones

Happiness is a warm million

The Australian newspapers in late-February shared the “outrage” of politicians and then the community over training that was provided to public servants by the American “happiness guru” Professor Martin Seligman.

The cost to the taxpayer seems exorbitant but the psychologist was from the US and was training delegates for many days. It is not unusual for US experts to charge over $US600 per hour plus travel and accomm0dation.

The Community & Public Sector Union‘s Assistant National Secretary Paul Gepp noted in a media statement that news of the expensive conference, which paid an American psychologist’s team more than $440,000, came with news of more layoffs of public servants, as 100 lost their jobs in the Crime Commission.

“Public servants are working hard to keep essential services going, keep our communities safe and make the stimulus package work,” said Mr Gepp. “Million-dollar, feel-good conferences don’t help get these jobs done. If the Government is looking to cut, we suggest it starts with junkets like this.”

The OHS context of this furore comes from the reasons for the training and whether the same benefits could have been obtained at a reduced price.

Media reports say that in parliament on 26 February 2009

“[Deputy Prime Minister, Ms Julia] Gillard attacked Liberal frontbencher Andrew Southcott for attempting to “parody” Professor Seligman, who she described as a “noted educationalist”.
“He is the leader in the development of (a) resiliency program that has been shown to make a difference to mental health issues amongst young people, including issues like anorexia and depression. That is actually serious and ought not to be cat-called about.”

SafetyAtWorkBlog has written previously about the workloads of the public sector under the Rudd government and how the government has chosen not to set reasonable production targets. The Seligman seminars are an example of trying to treat the symptoms and not the cause. Seligman’s programs are not the issue here as the results claimed may be absolutely justified.

Part of the problem for the government is timing, and in this, it shares a lot with behavioural-based safety programs. Whenever a company introduces a wellbeing program, or a happiness seminar, or resilience training, or a team-building extreme sports excursion, it indicates to me that either the company is one that has already tried the traditional approaches to controlling workplace hazards, hasn’t the faintest ides what to do to improve the safety in their workplace , or has too much money in its human resources budget and needs to spend it by the end of the financial year.

Regrettably, the money spent on public service mental health has been poorly targeted and papers over the cracks whilst ignoring the structural instability of how it manages its people.

Kevin Jones

Category: wellness

Workplace bullying possibly increasing

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Passive smoking and casino workers

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Groundwork for employee engagement

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Global pressures on Australian workers compensation schemes

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Mental Illness and Workplace Safety

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Safety In Action Conference

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Happiness is a warm million

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