FEATURE
FOCUS ON ‘HEALTH’
AS MUCH AS ‘SAFETY’
Gareth Jenkins, Managing Director of DS Smith’s UK Packaging Division, explores how the beginnning of a
new year can present an opportunity for
employers to change the way they think and act on health and safety.
The beginning of a new year signifies a fresh start for the majority of us, using it as an opportunity to make resolutions. We’ve all vowed to lose weight, get fitter, give up alcohol, but these are often forgotten before January is even over. The same thing can sometimes be said about the ‘health’ in health and safety but, in my view, investing in workplace health and wellbeing programmes can pay off many times over.
Most organisations have health and safety policies, and, as a manufacturing business, we take safety extremely seriously at DS Smith. We operate a programme called ‘Safe Systems of Work’ and since its introduction two years ago we have seen safety standards improve by 25% each year. However, in many organisations the reality is that the ‘safety’ dominates these policies, and initiatives relating to employee physical and mental health often fall by the wayside, but at what cost?
According to the Health and Safety Executive, 23.3 million working days were lost due to work-related ill health in 2014–2015, the equivalent to each employee suffering from ill health taking 19 days off a year. This has a negative effect on an individual’s quality of life, but it also has a wider impact on health services and the economy, with NHS England estimating that this costs employers and tax payers around £22billion a year. Furthermore, research by the Department for Work
44
and Pensions indicates that almost 50% of the UK workforce will be 50 or over by 2024. This, coupled with the removal of the fixed retirement age five years ago, points to the fact that the UK workforce is ageing and more people are suffering from long-term health problems.
POSITIVE IMPACT OF A
HEALTHIER WORKFORCE When you consider these factors, they can have a huge impact on an organisation’s bottom line and it is clear that a healthier workforce has a direct correlation with increased productivity and more engaged and committed employees. I have always believed strongly that a healthier workforce impacts the business in so many ways; individuals are more engaged, real change happens at pace and our customers see a difference in the quality of their products.
Many organisations won’t hesitate to spend hundreds of thousands of pounds on a new piece of equipment but when it comes to investing in staff – who really should be a company’s biggest asset – they fail to do so as things like health and fitness programmes are deemed to be fluffy ‘nice to haves’ and many senior managers need to be convinced of the benefits of introducing wellbeing initiatives. This is a short-term outlook that is not only damaging to existing staff members, but may also prevent your organisation from attracting the very best new recruits.
www.tomorrowshs.com
“23.3 MILLION WORKING DAYS
WERE LOST DUE TO WORK-RELATED ILL HEALTH,
THE EQUIVALENT
TO EACH EMPLOYEE TAKING 19 DAYS OFF A YEAR.”
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