Creating Healthy Workplaces

Stress Reduction, Improved Well-being, and Organizational Effectiveness

Caroline Biron, Ronald J. Burke

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9781317158523
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business Education
• Index: Business

The contributions in Creating Healthy Workplaces include a number of interventions that relate the efforts undertaken by researchers and organizations together, to reduce stress and improve the mental and physical health of employees through positive change initiatives. Those working in the field of occupational stress have received criticism that too much emphasis has been placed on negative issues and that positive initiatives have been largely ignored. With the growing influence of the positive movement, this book explores the implications of using a positive approach as opposed to a stress management one and compares the types of interventions they each require. From a positive perspective, there is a need to understand the characteristics of healthy, thriving, and flourishing people and organizations. This book explores the implications of using a positive approach as opposed to a stress management one. Some of the interventions described in Creating Healthy Workplaces target individuals and their attitudes and behaviours, others target workplace relationships, work units and the wider organization. Outcomes such as reduced occurrences of smoking, obesity, depression, elevated blood pressure, accidents and workplace injuries, presenteeism, absence and staff turnover are reported. The factors associated with the success of these interventions are identified and advice is given as to how interested individuals and organizations might proceed to develop worksite interventions on their own.

Chapter 1 Improving Individual and Organizational Health: Implementing and Learning from Interventions

Ronald J. Burke

DOI: 10.4324/9781315574608-1

Abstract

This introduction sets the stage for the chapters that follow. Factors that diminish or enhance levels of individual and organizational health are identified from the literature. A case is then made for the benefits of individual- and organizational-level interventions, although the evidence is mixed. Here we present a number of different interventions, efforts undertaken by researchers and organizations together, to improve the mental and physical health of employees through a number of different change initiatives. Some interventions target individuals and their attitudes and behaviours, others target workplace relationships, still others target work units and wider organizational features. Outcomes include various individual health and well-being outcomes such as levels of smoking, obesity, depression, elevated levels of blood pressure, accidents and workplace injuries, and absence and turnover. We identify factors associated with the success of these interventions (e.g. clear goals, top management commitment, employee participation) and indicate how interested individuals and organizations might proceed to develop worksite interventions on their own. These themes, and others, are addressed in more detail in the following contributions.

Introduction

This volume builds upon the already published Risky Business (Burke and Cooper 2010), The Fulfilling Workplace: The Organization’s Role in Achieving Individual and Organizational Health (Burke and Cooper 2012), New Directions in Organizational Psychology and Behavioral Medicine (Antoniou and Cooper 2011), and Improving Organizational Interventions for Stress and Well-being: Addressing Process and Context (Biron et al. 2012). In Risky Business, we examined the effects of human frailties on individuals, their families and workplaces, and the effects of toxic organizations on employees and organizational performance. In The Fulfilling Workplace: The Organization’s Role in Achieving Individual and Organizational Health, we focused on organizational initiatives that address the incidence and effects of human frailties and organizational toxicity. In New Directions in Organizational Psychology and Behavioral Medicine, the authors considered antecedents and consequences of workplace stress and ways to reduce potentially adverse effects. And, in Improving Organizational Interventions for Stress and Well-being: Addressing Process and Context, we made the case for more organizational-level intervention efforts and how these might be undertaken and evaluated.

Consider the following conclusions based on research studies about men and women in a variety of jobs:

• increasing violence against hospital-based nursing staff, primarily but not exclusively in emergency and psychiatric units;
• increasing levels of workplace incivility more generally (Leiter et al. 2011);
• recent mine disasters in the United States, Chile and China resulting in injuries and deaths;
• increases in obesity and being overweight among adults and children in many countries and their associated health-related risks;
• increasing incidence of workplace violence where disgruntled employees take out their complaints with attacks and shootings of those they hold responsible (Lester 2011);
• abusive supervision with corrosive effects on employees (Tepper 2000);
• abusive customers with negative effects on employees in the retail sector;
• doctors (usually physician interns) falling asleep during surgeries, patient interviews, and in a few cases while driving home from work (Burke 2010);
• Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) reported by first responders, police officers, fire fighters, and soldiers (Burke 2011);
• increasing levels of job insecurity among public sector employees as governments try to reduce their budget deficits;
• increases in stress associated with organizational restructurings, mergers and downsizings (Barling et al. 2005, Schabracq et al. 2003);
• the stresses associated with international travel, and the stresses experienced by expatriates working in new countries;
• about half the occupants of managerial and professional jobs are falling short in their performance (Hogan and Hogan 2001);
• a growing number of surveys of mangers and professionals have found that their levels of work stress has increased, and this has increased levels of psychological distress and diminished physical health (Cooper et al. 2009, Antoniou and Cooper 2005);
• more managers and professionals have reported working more hours in more intense jobs and taking less than their full allotment of vacation time (Hewlett and Luce 2006, Burke and Cooper 2008); this results in employees being fatigued, lacking in energy, indicating diminished well-being and prone to mistakes (Loehr and Schwartz 2003, Schwartz 2007, Seldman and Seldman 2008);
• increasing numbers of managers and professionals report work–family and family– work concerns (Drago 2007, Friedman and Greenhaus 2000);
• concerns have been raised about the character (greed, materialism, corruption) of managers and professionals given the increasing number of corporate scandals worldwide (Burke et al. 2011);
• increasing numbers of women who obtain business education, start their careers in large organizations, and then “opt out” (Maineiro and Sullivan 2006). Women continue to make little progress in career advancement in organizations worldwide (Davidson and Burke 2011, Wittenberg-Cox and Maitland 2008);
• most people are less ethical than they think they are. We have considerable knowledge as to the rationalizations they use to justify their unethical choices and why they are blind to their own and others’ unethical choices and behaviours;
• toxic organizational environments that diminish employee well-being and limit organizational performance (Kusy and Holloway 2009, Lubit 2004).

Our Rationale for This Collection

Several factors have come together for us in the development of this collection. First, there is a body of evidence suggesting that both individual factors and workplace experiences are associated with individual mental and physical health concerns and organizational well-being. There is a vital need for more intervention work that addresses these concerns. Second, this distress spills over into families and society as a whole in terms of emotional, physical and financial tolls. Third, we know a lot about the factors associated with these adverse outcomes. Fourth, we are gaining an increased understanding of the actual benefits to individuals and their workplaces following interventions designed to address particular health and well-being outcomes, and how best to undertake intervention projects in the workplace (Bambra et al. 2009, Caulfield et al. 2004). We have come to know a lot about implementing successful change, but it is not easy or guaranteed (Briner and Reynolds 1999). Successful change is complex. It is time consuming and requires that some resources be made available to carry out the project successfully.

Fifth, there is a need to showcase interventions that have worked, what was successful, what challenges remain, and what lessons were learned from these applied interventions. Learning from men and women working in actual organizations has been shown to be more useful than getting the same information from academics. We see this volume as performing a critical “sharing” function. Sixth, interventions that have been successful in one setting cannot be transferred directly into other workplaces but need to be tailored to fit particular work settings. “Off the shelf” or “one size fits all” thinking is likely to produce actions that fall short (Biron et al. 2009). But these case studies provide examples of success, how this success was achieved, and what workplaces need to think about before undertaking similar – or different – interventions. Seventh, interventions, when undertaken, need to be monitored, maintained, invigorated to prevent “fade out,” and evaluated. These processes indicate aspects of success and failure, and contribute to lessons learned for future efforts.

Interventions can be at different levels: individual, work unit, and total organization. Interventions can have different targets, including aspects of individual well-being such as satisfaction, work–family integration, depression, blood pressure, obesity, mental and physical heath, workplace relationships and interpersonal processes such as increasing workplace civility and reducing incidences of workplace bullying and abusive supervision, and organizational outcomes such as accidents and injuries, attendance and turnover, and violence against employees (e.g. nurses). Intervention content includes the following: education and training, data collection and feedback for employee problem solving and action planning, individual coaching and counseling, team building, identifying and changing workplace norms and rewards in ways that improve well-being and successful performance. There is a long history of organizational intervention covering at least the past 50 years. In the 1960s, organizational development (OD) interventions were undertaken to improve organizational performance (see Sashkin and Burke 1987, for a review, Argyris 1970), for example changes in the design of jobs (Davis and Cherns 1975, Hackman and Oldham 1976, 1980) and changes to organizational culture (Schein 1978). Unfortunately there has been relatively little effort made to conduct research studies on the intervention process and the success of organizational interventions since then. This situation is now slowly changing (see Biron et al. 2012).

In this collection, we assemble current thinking and research evidence relevant to enhancing the satisfaction and mental and physical health individuals achieve from all their life roles – the whole person – with particular attention to workplace experiences and their association with a wide range of health and well-being outcomes. Thus it is applied and practical. Managers and policy makers have indicated that they learn more from interventions that have been undertaken in actual workplaces and from the experiences of individuals working in these organizations.

What Do we Mean by Well-Being and by Healthy Organizations?

Most writers and researchers on individual well-being typically see well-being as including physical and psychological health. And health is not just the absence of illness but also a state of optimal functioning: individual and organizational health have both positive and negative aspects (Csikszentmihalyi 1990, 2003, Fredrickson 2003, Seligman 2002, Tetrick et al. 2012, Hoffman and Tetrick 2003). This also means that the development and implementation of organizational interventions must consider both positive and negative aspects of the work environment. Positive and negative aspects of the work environment often co-exist (Cameron 2007). The contributors in this volume share their experiences of various types of interventions at both the individual and organizational levels, with targets ranging from stress reduction to improved well-being. As Biron discusses in the concluding chapter of this book, we posit that creating healthy workplaces entails the implementation of sustainable interventions at the individual and organizational levels. Whether these interventions aim to improve well-being or to reduce stress, they all aim to create...