What does your employee's ergonomics journey look like?
Every organization who has an ergonomics program that offers ergonomics evaluations creates a journey for its employees. What does your employee ergonomics journey look like?
Smooth Sailing or Rough Seas?
Is it a smooth sailing journey, or one riddled with stormy seas and crashing waves? What makes one journey different from another?
It depends on how prepared you are as an employer to take your employees on a pleasant sail that will resolve their concerns by the end of their journey.
Unfortunately, many employers have ergonomics programs that are invisible, hard to find out about or only available for a few privileged employees, like those with medical conditions or work injuries. Your program should be proactive and focus on prevention, well-being, and process improvement, engaging the employee along the way to the best results.
Your ergonomics process should be well-known, easily accessible online through the click of a "call to action" button on your HR or Safety webpage. Not buried beneath mounds of red tape, or only if your employee asks the right person, or emails their request multiple times.
Your ergonomics process should be available to employees no matter what phase of employment they are in, from new hire, to relocation, to mature veteran. It should be as easy as a click away to ask for help.
The journey should be efficient, lasting just a few weeks but no longer than 90 days or you risk escalating the problem. It could easily go from a safety concern to early discomfort to progressive symptoms to a workers' compensation claim in less than 60 days if you don't set sail in a timely manner.
The ergonomics journey should include various "ports of call" or milestones along the way including communications from the Ergonomics Process Leader, awareness of when the evaluation will take place, when the report is finished, a time to review, actions to take, and completion of the process or the end of the journey for now.
What will your employee's journey be like? Smooth seas or man over-board?
Here is an infographic to depict the employee's ergonomics journey for a successful experience:
Every Voyage Needs a Captain
Every sea-faring voyage needs a captain, as does the employee's ergonomic journey. Like a captain of a ship, the Ergonomics Process Leader must properly help to navigate the employee's journey. Without the Ergonomics Process Leader guiding your employee's journey, they could be lost at sea. Don't let that happen. Stay on the course until your employee reaches the right destination for good ergonomics, better health, and well-being.
To learn more about the roles and responsibilities of an Ergonomics Process Leader, register for our online seminar replay.
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