Review article
https://doi.org/10.1515/aiht-2015-66-2558
Healthy occupational culture for a worker-friendly workplace
Igor Grabovac
; Institute for Occupational Medicine, University Clinic for Internal Medicine II, Medical University of Vienna, Austria
Jadranka Mustajbegović
orcid.org/0000-0001-7355-1637
; Department of Environmental Health and Occupational Medicine, School of Public Health “Andrija Štampar”, School of Medicine, University of Zagreb, Croatia
Abstract
Work has numerous health and wellbeing benefits, but it also involves physical hazards and psychological exertion. Today the scale has tipped toward psychosocial factors. Workers’ mental health affects their intellectual, emotional, and social growth, as well as work ability, productivity, and ultimately organisational productivity and competitiveness on the market. Even though companies may have an internal hierarchy that lowers stress at work, there are other formal and informal social processes that can affect (positively or negatively) the cohesion within the work unit. Safety culture of an organisation is a product of individual and group values, opinions, competences, and behavioural patterns that determine how occupational health and safety are implemented. Organisations that nurture positive safety culture understand the importance of health and safety and believe in prevention rather than dealing with consequences. Jobs that are stable, autonomous, and reasonably physically and psychologically demanding are far more likely to lower work-related stress and boost worker satisfaction. In fact, employee empowerment is one of the best ways to achieve good psychosocial health at the workplace.
Keywords
healthy organisations; mental health; organisational culture; stress; workers' wellbeing
Hrčak ID:
136504
URI
Publication date:
18.3.2015.
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