Workplace Well-being

How to Build Psychologically Healthy Workplaces

Arla Day, E. Kevin Kelloway, Joseph J. Hurrell, Arla Day, E. Kevin Kelloway, Joseph J. Hurrell

• Éditeur: Wiley-Blackwell
• Année: 2014
• ISBN:
  9781118469439
• Édition: 1
• Sujet: Psychology
• Sous-sujet: Industrial & Organizational Psychology

Workplace Wellbeing is a complete guide to understanding and implementing the principles of a psychologically healthy workplace for psychologists and other practitioners.

• Grounded in the latest theory and research yet filled with plenty of case studies and proven techniques
• Introduces the core components of psychologically healthy workplaces, including health and safety, leadership, employee involvement, development, recognition, work-life balance, culture and communication
• Addresses important issues such as the role of unions, the importance of leadership, healthy workplaces in small businesses, respectful workplace cultures, and corporate social responsibility
• Discusses factors that influence the physical safety of employees, as well as their physical and psychological health
• Brings together stellar scholars from around the world, including the US, Canada, Europe, Israel, and Australia

Part I
Introduction

1
Building a Foundation for Psychologically Healthy Workplaces and Well-Being

Arla Day and Krista D. Randell

Saint Mary’s University, Halifax, NS, Canada

Healthy workplace awards, employee choice awards, and “top workplaces” honors have gained a high profile in the media in recent years, with both small businesses and large corporations being recognized as being among the best places to work, in terms of their tangible perks and psychological supports and benefits to employees, their business productivity, and their focus on social responsibility. In 2013, Google retained their title, leading Forbes list of 100 Best Companies to work for, for two consecutive years based on the “100,000 hours of subsidized massages it doled out in 2012 [as well as] three wellness centers and a seven-acre sports complex, which includes a roller hockey rink; courts for basketball, bocce, and shuffle ball; and horseshoe pits” (CNN Money, 2012). In Glassdoor’s 2013 Employee Choice Awards, Facebook was named Best Place to Work, offering benefits that “help employees balance their work with their personal lives, including paid vacation days, free food and transportation, $4,000 in cash for new parents, dry cleaning, day care reimbursement, and photo processing … employees also commented favorably about the opportunity to impact a billion people, the company’s continued commitment to its hacker culture, and trust in their chief executive Mark Zuckerberg” (Smith, 2012a).

The abundance of these types of recognitions has been fueled by research showing the impact of job stress and unhealthy workplaces on worker ill-health (e.g., Kivimäki et al., 2013) and on increasing organizational costs (e.g., Noblet & LaMontagne, 2006), by media reports that summarize this research (e.g., “Lifestyle changes may ease heart risk from job stress,” Fox News, 2013; Gallagher, 2012, both reporting on Kivimäki et al., 2013; “Tackle work stress, bosses told,” Triggle, 2009), and by a growing interest in the concept of the positive workplace (Luthans, 2002). Despite this relatively recent interest among researchers, organizations, and the popular media in the psychologically healthy workplace (PHW), the concept of a PHW is not new: nearly 20 years ago, Cooper and Cartwright (1994) argued that “financially healthy organizations are likely to be those which are successful in maintaining and retaining a workforce characterized by good physical, psychological, and mental health” (p. 455). Moreover, many of the positive work outcomes (e.g., engagement, Schaufeli & Bakker, 2004; positive job affect, Van Katwyk, Fox, Spector, & Kelloway, 2000; organizational affective commitment, Meyer & Allen, 1997) that may be considered indicative of a healthy workplace have been extensively studied. Finally, the idea that workplaces can be viable domains in which to create and foster positive employee well-being initiatives has been promoted over the years (see, e.g., Elkin & Rosch, 1990).

Given the degree of interest in the general concept of PHW, there has been surprisingly little research on the feasibility of an overall healthy workplace construct and on the impact of such workplaces on employee and organizational well-being and functioning. This apparent lack of research may be due to several reasons: in addressing these healthy workplace issues, a variety of terms have been used, including “organizational health,” “positive workplaces,” and “workplace health and safety,” leading to a somewhat fragmented view of the concept. Similarly, as shown by the examples at the beginning of this chapter, there have been multiple, yet equally compelling, conceptualizations of what a healthy workplace “means” (e.g., tangible benefits and perks, supportive work environment, physical work environment, culture of respect). Finally, the literature has originated from several different disciplines (e.g., ergonomics, industrial/organizational psychology, occupational medicine, and safety management; Smallman, 2001), resulting in a lack of systematic integration across areas. Therefore, in this chapter, we explore these conceptualizations, providing an integrated framework based on past work to examine the components of PHW. This framework provides an organizational basis, upon which subsequent chapters draw to examine these healthy workplaces components further, as well as to examine the context and outcomes of such workplaces.

The Historical Development of the Psychologically Healthy Workplace Construct

Our current notion of a healthy workplace has evolved over the years, emerging from various disciplines (e.g., medicine, occupational health psychology) and incorporating several related, yet diverse, literatures (e.g., epidemiology, health promotion, positive psychology). Earlier conceptions of healthy workplace primarily concentrated on the physical safety of employees, focusing on the physical environment and on employees’ physical safety at work. Because of the increased interest in other aspects of individual health, the healthy workplace perspective expanded from these traditional physical health and safety models, to include models of health promotion, such that there was an emergence of organizational initiatives that centered around employees’ lifestyle and behaviors (e.g., smoking cessation programs, weight-loss programs). More recently, the concept of healthy workplaces has expanded even more to include broad psychosocial aspects of well-being at work (Burton, 2009; Kelloway & Day, 2005a, 2005b; Kelloway, Teed, & Prosser, 2008).

Physical environment

Originally, the term “healthy workplace” was predominantly used in the occupational health and safety domains to refer to interventions aimed at the physical environment. Healthy workplace initiatives in this context primarily referred to those aimed at eliminating hazards in physical environment (e.g., poor air quality, exposure to asbestos, noise, poor ergonomic designs, machine safety, electrical safety, falls; Stokols, Pelletier, & Fielding, 1996). This focus is still an important factor in today’s healthy workplace: Although there have been substantial reductions in the numbers of workplace deaths and injuries throughout the 20th century, occupational accidents and deaths still occur at an alarming rate (Stout & Linn, 2002). In looking at data from the past 30 years, 250,000–600,000 workers lost work time because of a work-related injury in Canada (Association of Worker’s Compensation Boards of Canada, AWCBC, n.d.). Moreover, statistics on work-related fatalities from 1982–2011 show that approximately 1000 Canadians died on the job each year (AWCBC, n.d.). According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (2013), almost 4,700 fatalities occur on the job each year in the United States, and over 1,180,000 workers lose time due to a work-related injury in the United States. The physical environment can also create long-term repetitive strain injuries (e.g., carpal tunnel, low back pain, neck pain, and tennis elbow; Hernandez & Peterson, 2012). There also is much research on the general physical environment, in terms of noise, lighting, and temperature (McCoy & Evans, 2004). That is, the spatial organization factors (e.g., division of space, size of work area), architectonic details (i.e., stationary aesthetics of the workplace, in terms of personalizing one’s workspace, workplace décor, and color schemes), and ambient conditions (e.g., lighting, temperature, noise, and air quality) all have the potential to create and exacerbate employee stress, leading to negative stress effects (e.g., physiological symptoms; McCoy & Evans, 2004). Conversely, there are many physical workplace factors, in terms of equipment (e.g., computers), services (e.g., parking, fitness area, cafeteria), and ergonomic workstations, which have the potential to alleviate stress and improve well-being (McCoy & Evans, 2004). The physical environment and the physical health and safety of employees are unarguably integral aspects of the concept of healthy workplaces. However, it should not be considered to be the sole attribute of a PHW.

Health promotion

In addition to the physical environment, the presence of health promotion programs (i.e., programs that focus on employees’ behaviors and lifestyles and that aid them in making healthy choices) can make a significant contribution to a healthy workplace (Grawitch, Trares, & Kohler, 2007). Cooper and Patterson (2008) argued that it is generally accepted that occupational health has three primary goals, in terms of preventing occupational disease, attending to workplace medical emergencies, and assessing employees’ fitness to work. However, they also argued that what previously has “not been accepted as main stream occupational health is the branch of medicine which deals with health promotion and wellbeing” (Cooper & Patterson, 2008, p. 65). They argued that the conceptualization of a healthy workplace needs to include health promotion.

In their study of Australian workers, Richmond, Wodak, Bourne, and Heather (1998) found that only 8% of respondents reported having no unhealthy lifestyle behaviors. There is a large amount of literature on the impact of work-based smoking cessation programs, as well as on other health initiatives, such as nutrition, weight loss, and stress management on employee’s subjective well-being (Griffiths & Munir, 2003). Therefore, “the workplace may be an almost ideal context for smoking cessation programmes since employees are present day in and day out and are accessible to motivation by special incentives” (Henningfield et al., 1994, p. 262).

Data clearly indicate the cost of unhealthy employee lifestyles to employers. For example, it is estimated that every smoker in Canada costs their employer approximately $3,400 every year as a result of decreased productivity and absenteeism, and increased insurance claims (Hallamore, 2006). In their meta-analysis of 25 studies on smoking, Kelloway, Barling, and Weber (2002) found that compared to nonsmokers, smokers missed an average of 2.07 more days of work each year, representing a 48.25% increase rate of absenteeism for smokers, and this difference seemed to be stable across countries. Similarly, in their meta-analysis of 29 studies, Weng, Ali, and Leonardi-Bee (2013) found that smokers mis...

Table des matières

• Cover
• Title page
• Copyright page
• About the Editors
• Contributors
• Preface
• Part I: Introduction
• Part II: The Psychologically Healthy Workplace
• Part III: Building a Psychologically Healthy Workplace
• Index
• End User License Agreement