PL09 CONNECTING THE DOTS: THE VALUE OF PEOPLE AT WORK AND THEIR HEALTH, SAFETY AND WELL-BEING
Authors: Seabrook Kathy A 
Published: July 2024

Introduction

People are at the core of every thriving business and their ability to contribute is based upon their health, safety, and wellbeing at work. This premise was demonstrated during the CoVID-19 Pandemic when this infectious disease resulted in labour shortages and manufacturing and supply chain disruptions for years afterward. CoVID-19 was a catalyst for a positive cultural shift in decision making for some companies around their workers’ health, safety, and wellbeing.

With the advent of the people side of sustainability and Environment, Social and Governance (ESG), there continues to be an evolving focus in the way a company identifies, assesses, and manages its material risks to their people and the environment. This people side of sustainability and ESG allows for new thinking in measuring the traditional non-financial value of people, employees, and workers. Employees are also known in the investment community as human capital. Human capital is the wealth or intrinsic value employees bring to a company.

Managing these impacts and dependencies, creates value for a company. The results of impact management, i.e., a positive change in worker health, on a worker, their family, the company, or customers can be measured and assigned a value. This includes the impact of its operations or service delivery on workers, natural resources, its brand and reputation, the economy and society. A value is can also be assigned to a company’s dependency on their workforce and natural resources to produce a product or provide a service.

Valuing people and nature in this non-traditional way accounts for an evolving global trend which is influencing decision making related to business and its balance sheet, workers, investing, governments, financial accounting regulations, the environment and economy. It is also raising interest in new ways to value people working in companies as well as interventions to improve upon their occupational health. Company stakeholders such as customers, investors, regulators and workers are also beginning to seek more transparency in current and future performance on how well a company identifies, assesses, and manages their material impact risks on people and society, in addition to the environment. Occupational Health can be a material risk impact. This is the social or people side of sustainability and ESG.

The premise of #TrueNorth is introduced, where ‘people and their health and safety are valued and reflected in all business decisions as a measure of true corporate performance.’ This notion is supported by examples of workforce value creation in the context of the Impact Pathways approach and work by the Capitals Coalition in their Valuing Human Capital in Occupational Health and Safety white paper and valuation in the National Safety Council (NSC) The New Value of Safety in a Changing World research recently published. It is also supported by recognized sustainability-oriented company performance.

This evolving culture change shift in valuing workers and their health, safety and wellbeing is at the core of this Plenary Presentation at the 34th International Congress on Occupational Health, ICOH2024, held in Marrakesh, Morocco on 3 May 2024.

Materials and Methods

This work embodies new ways of valuing people at work using an Impact Pathways approach, conceptionally based upon the Theory of Change to identify value created by people and occupational health interventions in the workplace. The methodology also incorporates the Sustainability Culture Change model and Seabrook Sustainability Maturity Curve to aid in operationalizing the premise of people and their health, safety and wellbeing and value creation.

Value to society is tied to the United National Sustainable Development Goals along with voluntary and mandatory standards such as published by the International Standards Organization, Global Reporting Initiative, European Union, Malaysia, and Brazil.

Additionally, this work incorporates a literature review and work by Yorkshire Water and Natura incorporating the true value of their people, human capital. Inputs also include virtual interviews with environmental, health and safety, occupational health, occupational health and safety professionals, Environmental Social Governance, and Chief Sustainability Officers. Finally, the work embeds the author’s experience with transformational change initiatives within two separate divisions of a Fortune 100 steel manufacturer over a four-year timeline.

An example presented demonstrates the interconnectivity between occupational health risks and the value and impact of ergonomic interventions for musculoskeletal disorders. Specifically, an intervention or health and safety risk mitigation (control) using manual material handling equipment in a loading dock area is a prevention technique. In this example, the impact could be on workers, their families, communities, the company, or customers. It is an opportunity to demonstrate the unrecognized value people create for a company and society when they are not disabled. In this example, musculoskeletal disorders could include rotator cuff injuries, carpal tunnel syndrome, tendinitis and other muscle strains and low back injuries.

Results

Traditionally, musculoskeletal disorders causing disability are associated with costs to employers such as absenteeism, increased health care, disability, and worker's compensation costs and lost productivity. The Impact Pathway methodology embeds a valuation approach to also include worker wellbeing, trust, brand impact, customer experience, trust and loyalty, quality products, employee hiring, and retention and quality adjusted life years aligned with positive health outcomes. This valuation demonstrates the value created by the intervention as well as the value of workers, their contribution, their families, communities and the company and its customers. The Impact Pathway approach is company and operations specific, akin to job or task specific risk assessment.

The results of an impact Pathway inform decision making. Decision making in the ergonomic intervention example, influenced the type of intervention, overall job and work design, procurement of manual handling equipment, its use by loading dock workers, product quality and integrity, work efficiencies and the wellbeing of the worker. Influencing decision making that values people and the environment is the goal of this work.

Conclusions

The work being presented introduces new thinking and methodologies to account for the impact and dependency a company has on its employees, workers, and communities. This is the people or social side of sustainability. This also includes the company’s impact and dependency on the environments in which they operate and procure natural and people resources. Connecting the dots between the people, economic and environmental side of sustainability, ESG, human capital management and occupational health, and using principles of organizational change and incorporating Impact Pathways begins to align a company’s leadership, commitment and engagement with an integrated approach to strategy and implementation, incorporating a true measure of value of their employees and workers to their business and performance.