This year, workers will be facing complex challenges with new variables that give rise to workplace injuries and cumulative physical stress. You may have noticed a great deal of reporting between 2020-2021 on “The Great Resignation” phenomenon, which was caused from pandemic-related decrease in production and opportunities for remote work in various fields. On the heels of this, we also saw marked increases in inflation along with a ripe job market. This created an opportunity for workforces to be highly selective regarding their employer and flexibility to move employer to employer.
Historically high employee turnover
The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that the job quit rates reached in 2021 are higher than those recorded in the previous two decades. By the end of 2021, quits as a percentage of total separations had reached an unprecedented 69.3% share, with layoffs and discharges dropping to 24.6% share.
Also significant is when employees are quitting: 75% quit in their first year and more than half quit in the first 180 days. A 2015 report identified that 50% of all workplace injuries are experienced by employees in their first 90 days on the job. Half of those injuries occur within their first month of work. Workforce attrition becomes a leading factor to introducing a high probability of workplace injury.
Higher injury rates are not necessarily indicative of an unsafe work environment or ineffective policies and procedures. Strains and sprains remain the most common type of workers’ compensation issue, representing over one-third of all job-related injuries. When an employee is either new to the work or not properly conditioned for it, there’s an increased likelihood that they’ll utilize behaviors and movement patterns that they are not accustomed to. A new workforce can be a susceptible workforce, even within the safest environments or while performing the simplest tasks.
Best practices for mitigation
So how must we address these consequential statistical correlations of work-related musculoskeletal injury risk? Invest in your workforce. Invest in their new hire training. Invest in their physical resiliency. Invest in their health and well-being. Invest in initiatives that are effective and create employee buy-in.
Changing employee behavior is no easy task. It takes commitment to your personnel. It takes bringing in the right resources and facilitating the right initiatives. A simple 30-minute new hire training workshop won’t translate to lasting change on its own, nor will sitting through a few online modules. Behavioral change is a multifaceted approach that requires commitment from the highest level of leadership and then percolated down to the workforce.
- Preventive exercise
The facets inclusive to this workplace culture change may be something small that affects every employee on a daily basis, like implementing a pre-shift warm-up. This creates daily physical preparation and recovery, yielding physical resilience.
- Training & education
Develop effective hands-on body mechanics training from knowledgeable resources; how to lift/lower, push/pull, pivot and rotate. Many new hire training or ongoing on-site training utilize a movement expert or sports medicine practitioner. Employees’ bodies are their fundamental tool and there is great value in providing guidance on using this tool efficiently and safely within the nuances of their work environment.
- Proactive on-site support
Create spaces where employees can reinvest back into their body. As fatigue settles in with their 180 days, as sore muscles and stiff joints begin to manifest, is there a space where employees can stretch, recover, or work with an on-site professional to restore their body and adapt to change, or enhance their health and well-being?
The true cost of an injury
But work-related injuries will happen. And when they do, they will cost you more in 2023. Workers’ compensation costs carried a stable rate increase of 1.5% over 2012-2019. Enter 2021, which reflected a rate change of 2% from 2020. In 2022, the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Actuary projects a 3.7% increase in claims cost. These increases are not only affected by inflation but also service utilization, with much of the claims attributed to physician visits and facility costs.
Workforce attrition alone is already a costly matter. Recent reporting, for example, showed that Amazon had lost $8 billion annually due to attrition rates that reached 81% across all levels at its peak. When workforces turn over and injuries do occur, they’ll end up costing businesses more than they might have under previous economic conditions.
However, the corollary variables that make up this cycle of attrition and injuries move together in the opposite direction when change is implemented. Surrounding your employees with the right training and resources not only arms them with the know-how and resilience to perform the work, but it can also serve to proactively prevent injuries. Musculoskeletal injury prevention goes beyond ensuring proper biomechanics and physical preparation— if and when soreness and/or discomfort arise, is there an avenue to mitigate those early warning signs before they manifest into a costly recordable injury?
How to achieve employee buy-in
There’s more to injury prevention than offsetting medical expenses and limiting OSHA recordables; it’s also deeply connected to the care and well-being of the individuals that make up your workforce. This is the employee side of what we call UpTime.
- Preventing them from having to undergo a life-changing surgery.
- Enabling them to stay on shift and provide for their families.
- Enhancing their overall well-being so they can enjoy whatever physical pursuits they wish outside of work.
Communicating these benefits is critical to achieving employee buy-in and optimal program participation. When employees feel that employer-sponsored initiatives are about and for them, they take part in them, they believe in them. They feel invested in.
When an employee has had low back soreness for the past several years and then they are able to confide in an on-site resource that not only knows how the body functions and may heal, but knows the intimate physical demands of their work, they are able to make strides on the road to improvement—not only because they’re receiving valuable care from a medical professional, but also because they are feeling cared for. Not only does this impact the employee directly, but will also spill over to their colleagues and positively influence morale. In this manner, employee health and wellness are the central goal; through that, a decrease in attrition rate and work-related injuries become the indirect result.
BIOKINETIX can help
BIOKINETIX’s groundbreaking approach to occupational medicine has saved its clients more than $109 million since 2004 and is changing how businesses address employee injury prevention, health, well-being, and productivity. BIOKINETIX is confronting the causes of workplace injuries head-on.
Schedule a demo today to discover how our customized programs can help prevent your next workplace injury.
