Are organisations focusing enough on well-being?

Organisations are focusing more on well-being as they consider mental health, work life balance, stress levels and team relationships as important supports for productivity, according to a global expert.

Dr Todd Conklin, an international health and safety advocate and author, has been in NZ on a speaking tour hosted by the New Zealand Institute of Safety Management (NZISM).

Conklin defines safety as “the ability for workers to be able to do work in a varying and unpredictable world.”

He said well-being complements and supports the more traditional focus on incident prevention because “happier and more content workers are safer, as well as more productive”.

The benefits of workplace well-being have been highlighted by the Mental Health’s Foundation, Working Well Guides showing it delivers 31% higher productivity, 37% more sales, three times more creativity, increased customer satisfaction and a better reputation as a good place to work.

He added that the increasing attention on well-being indicators come as director responsibility grows and high-profile cases of worker maltreatment are reported regularly.

“Health and safety in NZ has evolved rapidly over the last decade and the recent focus on well-being mirrors the current national debate,” he said.

“If you take each organisation as a microcosm of a country, it is important to ensure everyone has the best environment in which to work – and this means, a physical, personal and relationship environment.

“Many of the things people consider important now such as respect, acceptance, a chance to be heard, positivity and encouragement weren’t on the agenda in the past – but they are now.”

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Conklin explained that people also have more confidence to comment and share their views to contribute to a healthier and safer work environment.

Moreover, it’s vital for workers to learn from each other, and management to look to their workers for guidance – there needs to be a “trusting pan-organisation environment” to improve safety.

“This all-of-worker approach is also vital in looking after New Zealand’s talent, made even more important by the fact there is a shortage,” he said.

While well-being is rising up the agenda he also emphasises that ensuring safety remains critical.

“Incidents that injure grab headlines and while we are not going to prevent errors, because people make mistakes, we can create systems to absorb error and train organisations to fail safely,” he said.

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“This means learning about areas of potential weakness before an incident occurs – this is called pre-accident assessment, a far better way of learning than after something has happened when there’s been impact.”

Conklin added that health and safety is now more accepted as an essential part of everyday management, and its status as a profession, as well as the numbers involved, are growing.

“It has moved away from the image of a person getting in the way of business and ticking healthy and safety boxes on a clipboard.”