The business case for developing a Return to Work Program is actually two-fold.
The focus and emphasis must be on returning injured employees to productive work.
The second part of the business case relates to the financial and the productivity benefits of a Return to Work Program.
There’s huge financial gains for any employer on their bottom line in returning employees to productive work.
The underlying reasons behind the philosophy are both economic and ethical.
For senior management to accept Return to Work as being a positive feature is back centered around the cost side.
Because at that level, that’s what you’re talking about - you’re talking about cost.
And then, of course, on the ethical side what we’re trying to do is do the right thing by our employees
and make sure that they’re feeling looked after, that they don’t feel a loss of income and support by the rest of the group.
You know, the business side to me is not the most important side.
It is about the person and bringing them back and making them feel that they’re needed and we care.
Working for the Fairmont organization is something that encompasses their whole life.
And we want them to believe and understand that we care about their well being.
In a process like ours, where we’ve got in-line manufacturing, staff is a very expensive component of what we do.
If we can manage that properly, it does translate into efficiencies - that ultimately is preservation of capital.
We want to have people back to work as quickly as possible because once they’re off work,
the longer they’re away, they tend to lose connection to the company and to the work.
When we can keep someone back working, it shortens that length of time to get back from modified duties up to regular duties.
We’ve got sometimes dozens of years invested in some of these skills.
We've got people that have been here for 25 years.
So there’s an efficiency that’s lost. There’s potentially quality control that’s at risk.
You know, whoever’s injured and home was probably pretty good at what they did.
They know more than most, and we can’t lose that tribal knowledge, as we call it.
Previously we were averaging 700 to 800 time loss days.
Our experience rating and claim costs were high.
Now after three years of a successful Return to Work Program, we have 100 to 150 work loss days.
So we decreased that by 86 percent,
and our claim costs has decreased by 65 percent.
The cost of our WorkSafe premiums have dropped dramatically.
We had a surcharge back in 2003 and 2004. We are now at a discount.
The Return to Work Program is about more morale than anything else.
That helps the business side. So it’s not a focus on bottom line.
It’s not a focus on saving dollars. It’s a matter of saying, if this person, if we can bring them back gradually,
then they will come back when they’re fully fit, in a lot better frame of mind
than they would be if they were sitting at home.
Getting people back to work faster is going to support them in their lives
and to support the company in its endeavours to keep our costs in line and to produce good product for our customers.
It comes back to us in peace of mind and dollars.
And it’s not difficult. I do harder things than this.