Work Environment Management Research Articles

The Work Environment Management in the Aspect of the Safety Shaping at the Administration and Office Workplace

Abstract The management of the work environment aims at shaping all elements of the work environment, also in the aspect of safety. All activities in the field of planning, organizing, conducting and controlling individual elements of the work environment are aimed at optimizing the working conditions. In office and administrative work many factors affect the level of occupational health and safety.In the paper, the selected physical factors of the work environment - lighting, noise and microclimate - at the office and administration position in order to shape a safe, ergonomic and optimal workplace have been analyzed. The article uses measurement methods using devices - noise, lighting and microclimate meters

Antecedents of women managers’ resilience: conceptual discussion and implications for HRM

PurposeThis paper aims to provide a framework with the antecedents of women managers’ resilience in SMEs.Design/methodology/approachThis developmental study uses a comprehensive literature review and a set of propositions to identify the antecedent of women managers’ resilience and develops a conceptual framework for resilience.FindingsThe results indicate that in addition to personal resilience traits, interactive engagement with the work environment, career adaptability and positive human resource management (HRM) interventions are the main antecedents of women managers’ resilience.Research limitations/implicationsThis paper contributes to theory by providing a new perspective on the study of resilience as a process at the organisational level and as a trait at personal level. It contributes to the women employee-centric resilience discussion in HRM literature and explores the relationship between resilience and women managers’ career progression. This is a developmental study, and despite the strengths of the undertaken approach, there are a number of limitations due to the lack of empirical evidence. Therefore, future research activities should focus on validating the framework and determining any potential boundaries of this resilience framework.Practical implicationsThe study reveals a number of practical implications leading to a recommended resilience toolkit for HR managers of organisations to develop and promote resilience in their women managers and aspiring managers.Social implicationsThe social implications of this study include the social relationships within the work-setting, better employee engagement and interaction with the work environment and flexible career progression pathways.Originality/valueThe paper is based on rich conceptual and theoretical discussion that identifies the key antecedents of women managers’ resilience. The study also conceptually establishes the moderating relationship between women managers’ resilience and work stress and burnout.

Patient safety walkrounds; 5years of experience in a developing country.

Patient safety walkround (PSWR) is an appropriate technique for senior managers' participation and collaboration with frontline staff to promote safety culture in hospitals. This study was conducted to assess the 5-year PSWR experience in Shahid Mahallati Hospital in Tabriz, Iran. This was a triangulated cross-sectional study. All documents, instructions, reports, action plans, protocols, and verbal feedbacks on PSWRs were reviewed from 2013 to 2017. Data were extracted using goal-driven extraction form and analyzed using Excel 2016 software. A total of 174 90-minute PSWRs were conducted during the study period, and 1372 safety issues were identified. Work environment factors (32.5%), organization and management (18.14%), and tasks (18.07%) were the most frequent identified issues, respectively. About 75.5% of the issues were resolved through corrective interventions implementation. PSWRs provide a great opportunity to identify and resolve the safety issues in the hospitals. Senior managers' participation and their support of staffs opinions and innovations were reinforced through PSWRs. Moreover, it creates mutual trust and safety responsiveness at all organizational levels in the hospital.

Structured Multidisciplinary Work Evaluation Tool (SMET): Reliability testing of a multidisciplinary/multifactorial work questionnaire.

Occupational health services (OHS) are rarely involved in preventive issues and systematic work environment management. The Structured Multidisciplinary Work Evaluation Tool (SMET) questionnaire was created to address the lack of multidisciplinary/multifactorial OHS tools with the aim to be used in preventive issues and systematic work environment management. The aim of this study was to evaluate trustworthiness of the inter-rater reliability in the qualitative analysis of the open-ended items and intra-rater reliability of the self-estimated items in the SMET questionnaire. A qualitative comparison of the inter-rater reliability in the qualitative analysis of the open-ended items was performed to evaluate trustworthiness. The intra-rater reliability of the self-estimated items in the SMET questionnaire were analysed with Elisabet Svensson method. Qualitative analysis of the open-ended items showed good trustworthiness. The self-estimated items showed a high percent agreement (PA), 0.98-0.99 in the physically, 0.99 in the environmentally and 0.98-1.0 in the psychosocially demanding items. A low degree of systematic errors and individual variability were found. The SMET questionnaire shows good trustworthiness and intra-rater reliability and can be used to follow up and evaluate work environmental interventions.

Between advocacy, compliance and commitment: A multilevel analysis of institutional logics in work environment management

In this study we explore the development and enactment of institutional logics in the field of work environment management. We show how three historically developed logics constitute different values and practices that guide professionals’ organizational action. Using both historical and contemporary qualitative data, we show how the three institutional logics are present in the field of work environment, and how the logics are enacted simultaneously by actors within four large organizations in Denmark. The study contributes to the literature on institutional logics. The logics perspective is combined with critical realism to describe the inter-relatedness between the levels of society, institutional fields, and organizations, and by elaborating the near-decomposable relations between institutional logics and orders. The study contributes to the literature on work environment management by investigating the ideational lenses through which regulations and interventions are perceived by organizational actors, and how these perceptions may lead to different organizational outcomes and outlooks in work environment management.

Return-to-work support programs for workers on sick leave: a systematic review and meta-analysis

We are responsible for answering the research question, "Does a return-to-work program improve the returning outcome?" This is one of the six research questions in the evidence-based "Return-to-work Guidance in Occupational Health 2017" developed by the Kanto branch of the Japanese Society of Occupational Health. This study aimed to integrate the effectiveness of the return-to-work program to improve the state of sick-listed employees suffering from cardiovascular disease, cancer, and musculoskeletal and mental health problems. Three different databases, PubMed, Cochrane Library, and Ichushi-Web were searched. Based on the results of a systematic review, the guidance developing group created the draft of the recommendations with evidence to decision framework and used a poll to determine the recommendations. We integrated the evidence from a systematic review and meta-analysis at the disease level. This study protocol was registered with PROSPERO (the registration number is: CRD42016048937). A total of five articles on musculoskeletal diseases and six on mental health problems were retrieved. No articles in the cardiovascular and cancer areas matched the eligibility criteria. When workers suffered from musculoskeletal disorders, the rehabilitation group statistically returned to work earlier than the usual care group did [HR 1.58 (95% CI 1.26-1.97), -40.71days (95% CI -60.69--20.72) ]. In the mental health problems group, the psychological intervention program group had statistically less days of sick leaves as compared to that in the usual care group [-18.64 days (95% CI -27.98--9.30) ]. It might be suggested that work environment management, work management, tackling psychological problems, cognitive behavioral approach, and several meetings with supervisors and occupational health staff, in addition to a direct focus on backache contributed to the early return-to-work of workers suffering from musculoskeletal disease. Regarding mental health problems, interviews with a psychological approach and consultations with psychologists and psychiatrists might be effective in reducing the days of sick leaves. However, because these methods were investigated in Europe, we need to be careful when introducing these practises in Japan due to the differences in the occupational health support systems. Further, high quality evidence level studies are needed in Japan.

Study protocol of an effect and process evaluation of the Stamina model; a Structured and Time-effective Approach through Methods for an Inclusive and Active working life

BackgroundThe working environment should be a naturally integrated part of business development. Provisions are in place that address the employer’s obligations to investigate, carry out and follow up activities in such a way that ill health and accidents at work are prevented and a satisfactory working environment is achieved. Still, there are organizations that not properly perform systematic work environment management. In order to improve adherence, interventions and models focused on these issues need to be easy to understand and provide rapid feedback of results in order to be implemented. The Stamina model has recently been implemented in Sweden. The model is a participatory organizational systematic model facilitating the work environment, productivity and quality. It is a support model that provides structured and recurrent feedback in the systematic work environment management. The aim of the present paper is to thoroughly describe the Stamina model and the studies that are designed to investigate the effect, to increase the understanding of how and why the model was or was not effective, and to identify factors that facilitate implementation.MethodsThe paper presents a project consisting of two related evaluation parts. Part one is an effect evaluation with an active group applying the Stamina model and a control group. This part investigate effects on proxy outcomes that are relevant for health and productivity. Part two is a process evaluation with a qualitative design. This part will be based on semi-structured interviews with various stakeholders, such as employees, first line managers, project managers, facilitators and representatives from the management group, in the organizations.DiscussionMany interventions found to be effective in research projects fail to translate into meaningful outcomes across multiple contexts. In this project a participatory approach will be adopted, including the possibility to modify the model according to organizational needs and preconditions. Valuable knowledge regarding the design and implementation of the model will be generated in order to develop a model that is suitable and sustainable in organizations.

The roles of doctors, nurses, and industrial hygienists in the healthcare management services in Korea: a comparison of the opinions of specialized health management institutions and entrusted enterprises

BackgroundThis study aimed to identify the difference of perception about the role of appointing health officers by comparing and analyzing the response of entrustment workplace (EW) and specialized health management institution (SI). This is considered an important aspect of an institutional assessment to improve the quality of health management services.MethodsA survey questionnaire was mailed to 122 SIs and 319 EWs nationwide. The questionnaire survey was about the general characteristics of SIs and EWs and main occupations for each evaluation item. In total, 81 SIs (66.4%) and 30 EWs responded to the questionnaire. A logistic regression analysis was performed to compare the opinions of SI and EW.ResultsBased on the analysis, the items showing statistically significant differences were as follows. Doctors’ main tasks survey: “Guidance on their wearing personal protective equipment (PPE)” (OR: 4.58), “Guidance of improvement of work environment (WE)” (OR: 3.33), etc.; Nurses’ main tasks survey: “Guidance on their wearing PPE” (OR: 3.86), “Guidance for programs on health process in confined space (CS)” (OR: 0.36), “Guidance on the hearing conservation program (HCP)” (OR: 0.28), etc.; Industrial hygienist (IH)‘s main tasks survey: “Guidance of work through inspection (WTI)” (OR: 0.15), “Guidance on the improvement of WE” (OR: 0.32), “Management confirmation of substances used by process and Material Safety Data Sheet (MSDS)” (OR: 0.08), “Guidance on posting or keeping of MSDS and warning signs” (OR: 0.03), “Prevention of dust-induced medical problems” (OR: 0.28), “Guidance for programs of health process in CS” (OR: 0.39), etc.ConclusionsIt is necessary to educate the EWs to recognize the need for physicians to perform tasks, such as wearing a PPE, and instruction to improve WE. As for nurses’ tasks, such as education about the CS and the noise work, educating the nurses of the SI is regarded necessary as the demand of the EWs is considered. With respect to the unique tasks of IH, such as WE management and instructions for wearing PPE, among several other tasks of IH, training should be provided for improved IH recognition.

Managerial Practices that Support Lean and Socially Sustainable Working Conditions

Despite decades of using lean, there is little knowledge of how lean managerial practices affect working conditions. Thus, the aim of this study was to investigate in what ways managerial practices support socially sustainable working conditions (SSWCs) during a lean transformation. A mixed methods approach was used in this multiyear case study in a midsize Swedish manufacturing company. Assessment of work characteristics was combined with employee questionnaires and interviews with managers. Four practices were identified as instrumental for SSWCs: 1) a coherent lean approach with clear direction, 2) a value-creating leadership style comprising a participatorypromoting and caring leadership approach with joint focus on production and well-being, 3) conscious involvement of employees in a stepwise fashion, and 4) a focus on promoting meaningful jobs and health, aided by work environment management. Thus, managerial practices actively supporting important job resources as an integral part of the lean system seemed to support SSWCs.

Commitment or Compliance? Institutional Logics of Work Environment Management

Scholars of the work environment have pointed out how management ideas and practices inspired by a human resource approach are influencing the work environment efforts in Nordic organiza tions. In this paper, we use the ‘institutional logics’ perspective to propose heuristic ideal types of two institutional logics of work environment management:The logic of compliance as the ideal type of the ‘traditional’ approach to work environment management and the logic of commitment as the human resource informed approach. Through a side-by-side comparison of key characteristics, we analyze the two ideal types as instantiations of institutional orders on the societal level with the compliance logic being rooted in the orders of the state and the corporation, and the commitment logic as based on the orders of the corporation.The paper ends with a discussion on the how the two logics can influence concrete work environment practices and approaches to management in organizations.

Vocal Behavior in Environmental Noise: Comparisons Between Work and Leisure Conditions in Women With Work-related Voice Disorders and Matched Controls

This study aimed to assess vocal behavior in women with voice-intensive occupations to investigate differences between patients and controls and between work and leisure conditions with environmental noise level as an experimental factor. Patients with work-related voice disorders, 10 with phonasthenia and 10 with vocal nodules, were matched regarding age, profession, and workplace with 20 vocally healthy colleagues. The sound pressure level of environmental noise and the speakers' voice, fundamental frequency, and phonation ratio were registered from morning to night during 1 week with a voice accumulator. Voice data were assessed in low (≤55 dBA), moderate, and high (>70 dBA) environmental noise levels. The average environmental noise level was significantly higher during the work condition for patients with vocal nodules (73.9 dBA) and their controls (73.0 dBA) compared with patients with phonasthenia (68.3 dBA) and their controls (67.1 dBA). The average voice level and the fundamental frequency were also significantly higher during work for the patients with vocal nodules and their controls. During the leisure condition, there were no significant differences in average noise and voice level nor fundamental frequency between the groups. The patients with vocal nodules and their controls spent significantly more time and used their voices significantly more in high-environmental noise levels. High noise levels during work and demands from the occupation impact vocal behavior. Thus, assessment of voice ergonomics should be part of the work environmental management. To reduce environmental noise levels is important to improve voice ergonomic conditions in communication-intensive and vocally demanding workplaces.

Associations between the workplace-effort in psychosocial risk management and the employee-rating of the psychosocial work environment - a multilevel study of 7565 employees in 1013 workplaces.

Aims: This study examined the association between the workplace-effort in psychosocial risk management and later employee-rating of the psychosocial work environment. Method: The study is based on data from two questionnaire surveys – one including 1013 workplaces and one including 7565 employees from these workplaces. The association was analyzed using multi-level linear regression. The association for five different trade-groups and for five different psychosocial work environment domains was examined. Results: Limited but statistically significant better employee-ratings of the psychosocial work environment in the respective domains were observed among Danish workplaces that prioritized “development possibilities for employees,” “recognition of employees,” “employees influence on own work tasks,” good “communication at the workplace,” and “help to prevent work overload.” Conclusion: Danish workplaces with a high effort in psychosocial risk management in the preceding year had a small but significantly more positive rating of the psychosocial work environment by the employees. However, future studies are needed to establish the causality of the associations.

特集「林業労働環境と安全管理」にあたって( 林業労働環境と安全管理)

特集「林業労働環境と安全管理」にあたって( 林業労働環境と安全管理)

スイングヤーダにおける「伐倒同時集材方式」作業の安全性 : 伐倒木の落下が架線張力に与える影響( 林業労働環境と安全管理)

スイングヤーダにおける「伐倒同時集材方式」作業の安全性 : 伐倒木の落下が架線張力に与える影響( 林業労働環境と安全管理)

Personal and Professional Well-Being of Surgical Residents in New England

Although there is increasing literature about burnout and attrition among surgeons, little is known about personal and professional well-being of surgical trainees. General surgery residents from the 6 New England states participated in a cross-sectional, qualitative, self-reported survey to assess the domains of personal health maintenance, personal finance, work environment, and fatigue management as they relate to surgical training. All surgical residency programs in the New England region were invited to participate. Of these 19 programs, 10 elected to participate in the study. Three hundred and sixty-three total trainees were contacted with requests to participate, and 166 completed responses to the survey, resulting in a response rate of 44.9%. Ninety percent of respondents identified their programs as "university or academic." Substantial cohorts reported that during training they lacked basic healthcare maintenance visits (54%) and had undesired weight gain (44%). Although most found their stipends adequate, three-quarters worried about their finances (75%) and reported substantial educational debt (45%). Most residents enjoyed coming to work; however, the vast majority reported that work-related stress is moderate to extreme (92%). Most also reported that work-related stress negatively affects their overall well-being (72%). The mean Epworth Sleepiness Scale score among respondents was 14, consistent with moderate excessive daytime sleepiness. Surgical trainee well-being is critical to optimal patient care, career development, and burnout reduction. Surgical residents attend to their own preventive health maintenance, finances, sleep, and stress reduction with variable success. Residency programs should make modest programmatic accommodations to allow trainees to tend to various aspects of their personal well-being.

Organizational culture in the context of designing environmental management system

The rapid development of science and technology in the recent decades has led to the fact that men have mastered nature and achieved the unseen economic progress. However, this has resulted in environmental degradation to the extent that it brought into question the survival of civilization itself. The desire for profit has led to a fairly irresponsible behavior of companies, resulting in the destruction of natural resources and environmental degradation. This paper aims to draw attention to the environmental management system as a separate discipline. In more specific terms, that refers to the need for environmental and working environment management, while emphasizing the role of organiza­tional culture in that process.

Managing corporate social responsibility strategies of airports: The case of Taiwan’s Taoyuan International Airport Corporation

Airports need to manage corporate social responsibility (CSR) strategies for sustainable development. This paper develops a new structured approach for airports to evaluate, prioritize and categorize CSR strategies, using Taiwan’s Taoyuan International Airport Corporation (TIAC) as an example. Based on TIAC’s CSR-related activities, 18 CSR strategies grouped into 5 CSR goals (corporate governance and finance, green airport and environmental management, service quality and social relationship, employee and work environment management, and safety and security) are identified using the CSR value chain and diamond framework. The pairwise comparison method used in analytic hierarchy process and the decision-making trial and evaluation laboratory method are used respectively to evaluate the relative importance, feasibility and achievability of these 18 strategies and to analyze their causal relationships via expert questionnaire surveys. A new method is developed to plan and manage the implementation of CSR strategies by incorporating the viewpoints of both internal and external stakeholders, thus reflecting the practical effects and strategic implications of the CSR implementation. The result suggests that TIAC’s CSR strategies in relation to airport safety and security, service quality and corporate governance are most significant and have a high implementation priority. This paper contributes to the airport industry and CSR research by proposing a proactive mechanism for quantitatively evaluating, prioritizing and categorizing CSR strategies.

병원 급식소와 영양사의 특성이 HACCP 선행요건 수행도에 미치는 영향

Abstract The purpose of this study was to analyze factors that influence prerequisite program (PRP) performance of hospital foodservice operation. Data was collected through surveys given to 65 dietitians working in general hospital with ≥100 beds. Importance score of sanitary management for the self-operated establishments was significantly higher than that of contract-managed in the areas of working environment management (p<0.01), waste management (p<0.05), clean·disinfection management (p<0.05). Performance score of hospitals with ≤300 beds was significantly lower than that of hospitals with ≥300 beds in personal hygiene management (p<0.05). Moreover, importance score of dietitians spending ≥3 hours on inspection time was significantly higher than that of dieticians spending ≤3 hr in waste management area. According to the results of Pearson correlation analysis, PRP performance score was positively related with dietitian’s career (p<0.05), number of submitted beds (p<0.05), cooking process inspection time (p<0.05), dietitian’s job satisfaction ( p<0.01), and holding rate of utensil and equipment ( p<0.05). In addition, the results of multiple regression analysis showed that dietitian’s job satisfaction (p<0.001) and holding rate of utensil and equipment (p<0.05) had a significant positive effect on prerequisite program performance. In conclusion, improvement of working condition to increase dietitian’s job satisfaction and securing of utensils and equipments are high priorities for improvement of PRP performance.Key words: hospital foodservice operation, sanitary management, dietitian, prerequisite program, job satisfaction

Investigation of the working behavior of part-time occupational physicians using practical recording sheets.

We investigated the working behavior of part-time occupational physicians using practical recording sheets to clarify issues of occupational physicians' activities according to industrial groups or size of business. We collected 561 recording sheets in 96 industries from 11 part-time occupational physicians as collaborators, who volunteered to be a part of this research. We collected a variety of information from the practical recording sheets, including the industry in which each occupational physician was employed, the annual number of times of work attendance, occupational physician-conducted workplace patrol, and employee health management. We investigated their annual practices regarding work environment management, work management, health management, and general occupational health management. In addition, we analyzed the differences between the secondary and tertiary industry groups and between the group of offices employing 100 people or fewer (≤100 group) and 101 people and above (≥101 group) in each industry group. The median work attendance by all occupational physicians was four times a year; the tertiary industry group had a significantly lower rate of work attendance than the secondary industry group. The occupational physicians' participation in risk assessment, mental health measures or overwork prevention, and the formulation of the occupational health management system and the annual plan were significantly lower in the tertiary industry group than in the secondary industry group. We observed that for the annual number of times of work attendance, occupational physician-conducted workplace patrol was significantly lower in the ≤100 group than in the ≥101 group in each industry group. These findings show that occupational physicians' activities have not been conducted enough in tertiary industries and small-sized offices employing ≤100 people. It would be necessary to evaluate how to provide occupational health service or appropriate occupational physicians' activities for small-sized offices or tertiary industries. Thereafter, it would likely be beneficial to construct a system to support the activities of part-time occupational physicians as well as the activity of occupational health at workplaces.

Strategic Model for Ergonomics Implementation in Operations Management

Contemporary organisations have to search for new strategic ways in order to improve economic effectiveness and work productivity, as well as to maintain human resources in long term. Managers should ensure open management of changes in order to motivate employees to participate in it delegating more responsibility to employees. This can promote trust, support employees’ initiatives in operations improvement thus changing traditional organizational structure to flexible operations management. Therefore combined approach of macro- and micro-ergonomics in strategic operations management can result in effective improvement of labour productivity, management of technologies and healthy work environment. The developed model “Ergonomics implementation in operations management”, based on the overview of the recent prominent literature, shows that changes in operations management due to ergonomics implementation stimulate satisfaction of employees, increase productivity, and decrease costs resulting in an improvement of the process and product quality.