Category Archives: Employee Benefits

WHO Classifies Burnout as Occupational Phenomenon

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The World Health Organization (WHO) has officially recognized workplace burnout as an occupational phenomenon in the latest version of its “International Classification of Diseases” (ICD). This official designation indicates how serious workplace burnout and stress are as an impediment to a healthy, productive work environment, and how important it is for employers to take concrete steps to address it.

Since 1948, the WHO has published the ICD, which “defines the universe of diseases, disorders, injuries and other related health conditions, listed in a comprehensive, hierarchical fashion.” The last published version of the ICD defines “burnout” as a “state of vital exhaustion,” but the forthcoming edition has updated that definition, clarifying that it is a condition that occurs specifically in the workplace.

The new definition includes: “Burnout is a syndrome conceptualized as resulting from chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed. … Burnout refers specifically to phenomena in the occupational context and should not be applied to describe experiences in other areas of life.

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” The three factors the WHO identifies for classifying burnout are:

  1. Feelings of energy depletion or exhaustion,
  2. Increased mental distance from one’s job, or feelings of negativism or cynicism to one’s job, and
  3. Reduced professional efficacy

According to a 2017 Gallup poll, 23% of U.S. employees “reported feeling burned out at work very often or always, while an additional 44% reported feeling burned out sometimes.” When workers suffer from burnout, it can have serious effects on business performance. A 2017 survey conducted by Kronos Incorporated and Future Workplace also noted that “95% of human resource leaders admit employee burnout is sabotaging workforce retention,” and “nearly half of HR leaders (46%) say employee burnout is responsible for up to half (20% to 50%, specifically) of their annual workforce turnover.” This means higher recruiting costs, additional time for other employees and managers involved in the recruitment and training processes, as well as potential business interruptions and lost institutional knowledge.

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Gallup also noted that employees experiencing burnout “are 63% more likely to take a sick day,” and alarmingly, “are 23% more likely to visit the emergency room.

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” Indeed, in 2015, the Harvard Business Review says that workplace stress caused additional physical and psychological healthcare spending between $125 and $190 billion annually in the United States. Given the rising costs of U.S. healthcare and increasing recognition and treatment related to burnout, it is likely that these numbers have only increased.

Gallup reports that the top five factors most highly correlated with burnout are:

  • Unfair treatment at work
  • Unmanageable workload
  • Lack of role clarity
  • Lack of communication and support from manager, and
  • Unreasonable time pressure

The American Psychological Association’s Center for Organizational Excellence has outlined the importance of communication to maintaining a psychologically healthy work environment, both bottom-up and top-down. The APA’s recommendations include “providing regular, on-going opportunities to provide feedback to management,” and “leading by example, by encouraging key organizational leaders to regularly participate in psychologically healthy workplace activities in ways that are visible to employees.” The organization also emphasizes work-life balance, noting that instituting policies like flexible work arrangements and assistance with childcare can provide “benefits in terms of increased productivity and reduction in absenteeism, presenteeism and employee turnover.”

When companies take workplace stress seriously, and implement processes to address burnout and create healthy work environments, they see happier workers, higher retention and greater productivity, as well as lower costs. The WHO officially acknowledging burnout as a serious workplace concern should be a wake-up call for employers.

Japanese Companies Look to Cut Costs by Curbing Smoking

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Concerned about lost productivity and higher employee healthcare costs, many employers are taking serious steps to eliminate smoking among employees. In Japan, a number of companies and educational institutions are now even basing hiring decisions on whether an applicant smokes.

Some scientific evidence suggests that employers’ concerns about the added costs costs are valid. A 2018 study conducted by Ohio State University found that smokers in the U.S. cost private sector employers an average of $5,816 extra per year, excluding additional costs that the employees themselves may pay. These employer costs include “excess absenteeism,” “presenteeism” (lower productivity on the job), “smoking breaks,” “excess healthcare costs” and “pension benefits,” with time devoted to smoking breaks making up the majority of costs. Stopping smoking eliminates lost time for smoke breaks entirely, unlike other high-cost factors like healthcare and absenteeism, which could continue after an employee stops smoking.

Smoking is more prevalent in Japan than in the United States, especially for men.

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Although the rate has been falling steadily, a 2018 national study showed that 28.2% of men and 9% of women in Japan smoke, compared to 15.8% of men and 12.2% of women in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In April, more than 20 Japanese companies signed onto a corporate partnership to promote anti-smoking steps. Starting in spring 2020, for example, insurance company Sompo Japan Nipponkoa Himawari will not hire any new employee who smokes, and will require its high-level officials to sign a document pledging not to smoke during work hours. The private sector in Japan is not alone in pushing for less employee smoking—Nagasaki University announced last month that it would stop hiring faculty who smoke and banned smoking on campus, and Oita University has “put priority on nonsmokers” when hiring.

Part of this effort is incentivizing quitting.

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Employees who quit smoking at Japanese company Rohto Pharmaceutical Co., for example, get tokens they can use at the company cafeteria or for other benefits. Marketing firm Piala Inc. is also offering an extra 6 paid days off to non-smoking employees, and 4 of its 42 smokers have reportedly quit smoking thus far.

While programs to incentivize quitting may seem intuitive, according to Ohio State’s Micah Berman, lead author of the school’s study, these efforts may also be pricey for employers. “Employers should be understanding about how difficult it is to quit smoking and how much support is needed,” he said.
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“It’s definitely not just a cost issue, but employers should be informed about what the costs are when they are considering these policies.” These can include the costs of direct incentives like the ones noted above, or the additional healthcare cost of prescription drugs or counseling to help quit. However, in the long-term, companies that implement cessation programs—especially those that have a large number of smoking employees to start—are likely to see the benefits outweigh initial investment costs within 4 years.

Companies may save money by encouraging employees to quit smoking, especially in lost time and healthcare spending, but they should examine the costs and benefits of instituting formal or informal policies to change their employees’ habits. Running afoul of legal protections, as well as making workplaces unfriendly to employees who smoke, being perceived as interfering with employees’ activities outside of work and other considerations may outweigh employers’ concerns for their workers’ health and excess spending.

Japanese companies have stated that they believe these steps are legal, and some U.

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S.-based companies, including Scotts Miracle-Gro and Weyco, Inc., have reportedly made similar efforts to discourage their workforces from smoking. Some companies in the U.S. may be unable to explore such potential programs, however. According to legal experts, “around half of [U.S.] states currently legally protect employees from being denied positions, or having employment contracts terminated, due to tobacco use.”

Solving the Talent Crisis in the Risk Profession

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BOSTON—In a time when skills become obsolete much quicker than in previous eras and the professional landscape is rapidly evolving, businesses need to be more agile and adaptive. Companies with these characteristics tend to meet their clients’ expectations more effectively, have higher employee engagement, and see more success generally. They can accomplish this by bringing on and nurturing younger or newer talent.

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While more schools are offering risk-related academic programs, however, the industry is still not attracting enough young people to its ranks.

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How can companies attract new talent to the risk management industry and keep them from leaving?

“I hear people saying all the time, ‘I wish next-generation people would stay,’” said Monica Merrifield, vice president of risk intelligence at YMCA of Greater Toronto. At today’s RIMS 2019 session “Solving the Talent Crisis in the Risk Profession,” Merrifield and fellow panelists Joseph Milan, principal at JA Milan and Associates LLC, Grace Crickette, vice president of administrative affairs at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, and Andrew Bent, risk director at Sage Group plc., discussed why young people aren’t joining the risk management field, and what companies can do to bring them into the industry and keep them there.

Crickette described the next generation as purpose-driven and passionate, expecting a company to have a bigger vision and to be clear about the employee’s role in that vision. They work best in high-collaboration and low-hierarchy environments, and expect a variety of work, as well as meaningful interactions with leadership. They are interested in creating a pathway to growth more than advancement—not necessarily a ladder, Crickette said, but “a lattice.” In part, companies and hiring managers can attract these young professionals by examining their own operations and internal culture to ensure that they address these concerns and are open to new perspectives and contributions. When companies emphasize the values of diversity (both of ideas and people), humility, and learning from mistakes, this will make them more appealing for the next generation of talent, Merrifield said.

Merrifield and Crickette also stressed the importance of cultivating new talent, and how young professionals can grow by seeking out mentors and sponsors who will create opportunities for them, even if those opportunities are not at their current company.

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“Don’t wait for a sponsor, ask for a sponsor,” Crickette said. Multiple panelists also encouraged young professionals to pursue education and accreditation for advancement and growth in a risk management career, Crickette urging young people to take more tests and get professional designations to set themselves apart and learn more, and Milan describing the benefits of the RIMS-CRMP certification. Milan also advised young professionals to be courageous enough to share new ideas in their workplaces, and Merrifield said that they should focus on soft skills, which are less likely to be automated in the future.

When people lament that they wish millennials would stay, Bent said he responds by pointing to studies showing that millennials are actually more loyal when their employers present them with a “why”—a deeper purpose for their work and a reason to stay. He said that companies should examine what they are actually doing to attract and retain younger talent, keeping in mind that millennials and younger generations are better at moving on when they see that a new opportunity elsewhere is better.

Crickette added that the industry needs to show young people that there is more to the risk management business than just insurance, and explain how diverse the field is. Bent and Milan both also said that the risk profession is mostly associated with bad things happening, and that risk management professionals could help change that perception by showing how risk management can create opportunities, showing up in their communities during both good times and bad.

It is possible to get young people to join and stay in the risk management profession, these experts stressed, but companies must do the work to adapt to the employees they want, creating opportunities for young risk management professionals to engage and grow.

Are Your Employees Preparing to Quit?

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A new study shows that changes in employee engagement and loyalty can indicate whether an employee is planning to leave, and these changes may start up to 9 months before an employee quits. In The 9-Month Warning: Identifying Quitters Before It’s Too Late, workplace data analytics firm Peakon and its research arm Heartbeat drew on polling of 30 million employees in 125 countries to help employers spot the signs and mitigate resulting risks.

Turnover and recruitment to replace departing employees is costly for companies. The hiring process can take weeks or months, and includes both direct and indirect costs from paying recruiters to staff time and lost productivity. Training new staff also takes time and money, and losing institutional knowledge when an employee departs can slow operations or, in a worst-case scenario, can even compromise client relationships or handicap major aspects of the company’s business. There can also be reputation costs, especially if the potential applicants see a stream of departures.

The study stresses that decreasing employee engagement—which it defines as “the level of personal investment an employee has in their work”—is an important indicator of imminent departure. Nine months before quitting, researchers found an employee’s engagement and loyalty to the company drop significantly. The study measured engagement by asking respondents, “How likely is it you would recommend [Company Name] as a place to work?” and measured loyalty by asking, “If you were offered the same job at another organization, how likely is it that you would stay with [Company Name]?”

Various factors contribute to a decline in engagement and loyalty, including in some counterintuitive ways. The study shows that respondents considered unchallenging work more of a reason to leave than having too much work. When their work is not challenging, employees’ sense of accomplishment begins to significantly drop 9 months before quitting, while their feelings about their workload stay relatively steady until their departure.

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Additionally, the study found that communication and relationships between managers and employees may be more important for retention than salary level or other factors. Employees are more likely to leave if they feel unable to discuss their pay with their manager than if they feel underpaid, and their manager’s support is more important than relationships with colleagues, feeling at home at an organization or believing in its mission.

When employees believe that they do not have opportunities for growth, they also become more likely to leave. This includes personal growth, advancement within the company and whether their managers encourage and provide pathways for growth.

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“When we feel our role is helping us develop into our best self, it can have an incredibly powerful impact on employee engagement,” the study explained.

Companies can address these factors in a number of ways, including offering training programs and growth opportunities, starting an employee recognition program, implementing more frequent or more in-depth employee engagement surveys and providing additional training for managers. One way companies can incentivize these steps is by tying executive pay and other rewards not just to financial performance, but also to retention.

By ensuring that employees feel challenged in their work, feel comfortable communicating with their managers and providing opportunities for recognition and growth, employers may reduce staff attrition and save on costly recruitment and training.

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