Occupational Health and Fitness Newsletter

Occupational Health, Fitness and Wellbeing

Newsletter January 2009

IT'S CRUNCH TIME

The economy's turned sour.

It's going to get worse.

In the year of the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin the phrase, 'survival of the fittest' comes to mind.

The prediction

As belts are tightened, the heat will be turned up on HR and OH&S departments to save every cent they can on absenteeism, presenteeism, workers compensation and staff turnover.

You can't afford to watch money go down the ABSENTEEISM drain.

Check your records now. If the average number of unplanned days off per person is more than 4 you've got a problem - staff who are

• in the wrong jobs

• in poor health

• poorly managed, or

• dudding their employer.

Here's the Health, Fitness and Wellbeing Climate Survey results from two groups I recently surveyed;

•	Survey A, (35 people) where staff take an average of 20 unplanned days off a year in sick leave and

•	Survey B, (16 people) where staff take an average of 3 unplanned days off a year.

(If you want to know what the Health, Fitness and Wellbeing Climate Survey looks like click here. To better understand the tables below it might be worth your while printing off the profile and completing it to see how you score yourself. It will be 5 minutes well spent.)

Scores over 5 on any one parameter have been registered as a symptom, issue or concern.

A. COMPARE THIS ...		B. ... WITH THIS
Organisation where people take an average of 20 days off a year		Organisation where people take an average of 3 days off a year
Symptoms / Issues / Concerns	% of people	Symptoms / issues/ concerns	% of people
Poor sleep	57	Overweight - by more than 10Kg	44
Musculo-skeletal dysfunction	57	Low level of fitness	31
Wrong job	50	Musculo-skeletal dysfunction	25
Under appreciated at work	43	Headaches	19
Headaches	36	Poor sleep	19
Lack of energy	36	Snoring, sleep apnoea	19
Fitness	36	Asthma	19
Colds and flu	29	Lack of energy	13
Overweight - by more than 10Kg	29	Elevated blood pressure	13
Mouth ulcers	29	Elevated cholesterol	13
Libido	29	Candida	6
Grinding teeth	29	Reflux, unsettled stomach	6
Under appreciated at home	29	Irritable bowel, constipation etc	6
Migraines	21	Itchy, rashes, psoriasis	6
Crook guts	21	Elevated glucose	6
Shakes	21	Excessive alcohol intake	6
Excessive alcohol intake	21	Smoking	6
Insecure	21	Caffeine	6
Depressed	21	Anxious	6
Snoring	14	Depressed	6
Irritable bowel	14	Work-life balance	6
Rashes	14	Unhappy family life	6
Smoking	14	Financial status	6
Caffeine	14	Frequent colds, flu, sinus	0
Anxious	14	Chest pain, palpitations	0
Candida	7	Mouth ulcers	0
Chest pain	7	Shakes, nervous mannerisms	0
Blood pressure	7	Grinding teeth	0
Unhappy family	7	Wrong job	0
Asthma	0	Under appreciated at work	0

The two groups are markedly different.

In group A there were 19 symptoms/issues/concerns reported by 20% or more of participants. It's a very high number.

50% indicated they were in the wrong job. 43% said they were under-appreciated at work. Their health status was poor. (I can also add that half the people in the group didn't know what they wanted to do when they grew up!)

They come to work tired, they're in pain, they feel miserable ...

In group B, there were only 3 symptoms/issues/concerns reported by 20% or more of participants. Plus I have never seen an organisation where nobody indicated they were in the wrong job or were under-appreciated at work. You'll go a long way to see a set of numbers like those exhibited by this group.

You can't afford to watch money go up in smoke with high rates of PRESENTEEISM. The Health, Fitness and Wellbeing Climate Survey also provides you with a quick and easy snapshot of the rate of presenteeism within your organisation.

If presenteeism is high people

• are tired

• lacking energy and vitality

• are in the wrong job

• feel under-appreciated at work

• experience continuous back, neck and shoulder pain

• have got a crook gut

• they get frequent headaches

• feel miserable

• have trousers that are so tight they're being ring barked ...

If the average score for an organisation on the Health, Fitness and Wellbeing Climate Survey is greater than 50 you know you have a presenteeism problem. Anyone scoring over 80 is a high risk candidate. Those scoring over 120 are in the extremely risk category as is the likelihood of their breaking down on the job.

However, be aware that whilst poor management may be a contributor to the breakdown, the most significant factors are likely to be personally generated.

You need to manage those risks.

You can't afford to pour more good money after bad down the WORKERS COMPENSATION black hole.

Check your records. If most of your staff are sitting down in an office, the premium should be around $600 (or less) per person. More than that and there's unmanaged risk all over the place.

It's a flawed system that

•	treats personally generated dysfunctions as work-related injuries and

•	allocates 100% of the blame for any twinge or disappointment to the employer.

I had one HR manager say to me that his staff treat his organisation as a branch office of Medicare!

What he didn't understand (at the time) was that by getting on the front foot he could dramatically lower the incidence of compensation claims, particularly for musculo-skeletal dysfunction. Lack of attention to risk was crippling his organisation - one that right now needs every single cent it can lay it's hands on.

He was relying on the opinion of the personal physician of those staff members who slapped a claim form on his desk. This is dangerous territory. I can tell you one thing; in the musculo-skeletal arena, in a high proportion of cases, doctor does not know best. Doctors are good at telling you what's wrong - 'Your staff member has a crook back'. They are not good at telling you the cause of what's wrong.

You need a second opinion.

Unless you have an OHF&W FIREWALL in place to stop the personally generated dysfunctions from being dressed up as work-related injuries you're going to have to cop it sweet - and sour!

To put that firewall in place you're going to have to insert a key performance indicator into the job description of every supervisor and manager so they have an obligation to look after the health as well as safety of the staff in the care.

You're going to have to audit risk and then manage risk of all sorts of health, fitness and wellbeing-related issues.

In these times you're going to have to work hard to retain good staff, experience staff.

You don't want to waste fists full of dollars RECRUITING AND TRAINING new staff because the old ones left, unhealthy and dissatisfied.

You need another key performance indicator for every manager and supervisor aimed at shouldering their responsibility for reducing the costs of employee turnover. High levels of turnover follow some managers around like a bad smell.

You're also going to have to work out how to recruit staff who are fit and healthy, as well as being competent to do the job.

It's time the medical examination (where people only have to fog up the mirror to prove they're healthy) is consigned to the same place that button-up boots went to.

You want staff who are fit and healthy, people who have a high level of personal vitality. The fact that they're alive is not a good enough entry criteria. As Percy Cerutty said, It's not that you're alive, but how much alive you are.'

In this day and age you need the results of a pre-employment health, fitness and wellbeing assessment to guide you in your staff selection process. Looks can be deceptive.

All other things being equal, you want to be able to select the fittest and healthiest candidate for the job. In the long run that may be the most important criteria.

You want to be able to measure 'how alive' people are before you employ them.

1.	My seminars are designed to inspire and motivate your staff to keep themselves fit and healthy to the best of their ability. Click here to read some testimonials.

2.	At the end of the seminars I provide you with a Health, Fitness and Wellbeing Climate Survey audit report which lets you know the risk you're carrying. Click here to view a host of audit reports.

3.	I can help you put in train a health, fitness and wellbeing strategy. Click here for more instructions.

THE OFFER

I'd like to come and show you how this system works and how you can get it up and running while there's still time.

Three hours is all it takes for me to show you, your senior managers and some of your staff how I can assist your organisation to save huge amounts of money on absenteeism, presenteeism, workers compensation and employee turnover.

If you're fair dinkum about knowing how this technology works, I'm more than happy to spend a day with you and your staff.

My time comes with my compliments.

Just fill in the contact form or give me a call (02) 6288 7703 and I'll arrange to meet with you.

Finally, at the start of another year, are you strong enough to finish?

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=gqantZJ6WwM

Pass it on. (If it won't open up at work - because of the firewall - send it home. If it takes a while to download, be patient, go get yourself a cup of tea - it's worth it.)

In the mean time stay tuned, highly tuned and remember, a dollar saved is a dollar earned.

John Miller

January 2009

If you're sick of receiving these newsletters, just send me a note and I'll take you off the mail list. If there are other people in your organisation whom you think would like to receive the newsletters, please send me their details and I'll get in touch with them