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DOWNLOAD: Eight cost-free steps to improve workstation ergonomics
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Great article - well presented, concise and accurate! Having spent many hours over many years trying to educate my patients (employees and employers) as to the vital importance of workstation ergonomics, I applaud anyone with a meaningful contribution - as in this case. Well done, Jody.
What people tend to forget is that the human operator at the desk is FAR more expensive in terms of TCO (!) than the pc, the desk, the chair, etc. Those items are all one-off purchases but the human operator is a lease, and generally not cheap either.
Just because the human element is (generally) highly adaptable and fairly flexible does NOT mean that the human frame should be subordinate to a "nice" desk or "economies" of minimal up-front office expenditure. That way leads to profound loss of staff performance, increased sick-days and general dissatisfaction.
If an IT manager has a very expensive piece of kit, eg. a mainframe server, it generally lives in air-conditioned comfort, with UPS's or backup generators, mirroring, backup devices and a rapid response support contract... Because it's worth it! On the other hand it's not hard to work out the real annual costs of a drop in staff performance (say 10%, times the no. of staff involved, times their average salary) caused by poor concentration, headaches, backaches, time-off and so forth due to lousy ergonomics.
As a chiropractor I was always frustrated if my patients suffered recurrences of their complaints, not just because I'm "a good guy" but because it also reflected on my own effectiveness! Would you take your car to a particular garage on a friend's recommendation if his or her car was always "in the shop", even if the main reason was due to his boss making him overload the trunk, drive it too hard and skip on the maintenance schedule?
Employers - and employees too - have a responsibilty to themselves, each other and to the company to protect the "human office equipment" by using decent ergonomics in the workplace. Even if it means spending a bit of money in the process. My practices are in both blue-collar and white-collar neighbourhoods and the single most common factor leading to people becoming patients was lousy seating, in the home, in the car and especially in the workplace. Lifting and sporting injuries come a distant second.
Think about it... what's bigger? The IT hardware/software bill, or the wage bill for the employees operating it all?
Mark Chippendale DC (UK)
What people tend to forget is that the human operator at the desk is FAR more expensive in terms of TCO (!) than the pc, the desk, the chair, etc. Those items are all one-off purchases but the human operator is a lease, and generally not cheap either.
Just because the human element is (generally) highly adaptable and fairly flexible does NOT mean that the human frame should be subordinate to a "nice" desk or "economies" of minimal up-front office expenditure. That way leads to profound loss of staff performance, increased sick-days and general dissatisfaction.
If an IT manager has a very expensive piece of kit, eg. a mainframe server, it generally lives in air-conditioned comfort, with UPS's or backup generators, mirroring, backup devices and a rapid response support contract... Because it's worth it! On the other hand it's not hard to work out the real annual costs of a drop in staff performance (say 10%, times the no. of staff involved, times their average salary) caused by poor concentration, headaches, backaches, time-off and so forth due to lousy ergonomics.
As a chiropractor I was always frustrated if my patients suffered recurrences of their complaints, not just because I'm "a good guy" but because it also reflected on my own effectiveness! Would you take your car to a particular garage on a friend's recommendation if his or her car was always "in the shop", even if the main reason was due to his boss making him overload the trunk, drive it too hard and skip on the maintenance schedule?
Employers - and employees too - have a responsibilty to themselves, each other and to the company to protect the "human office equipment" by using decent ergonomics in the workplace. Even if it means spending a bit of money in the process. My practices are in both blue-collar and white-collar neighbourhoods and the single most common factor leading to people becoming patients was lousy seating, in the home, in the car and especially in the workplace. Lifting and sporting injuries come a distant second.
Think about it... what's bigger? The IT hardware/software bill, or the wage bill for the employees operating it all?
Mark Chippendale DC (UK)
I visited a community college not too long ago and there I found sunken-in monitors, where they are entirely recessed into the desk, with a plexiglass top to the desk to see down them. Keeping the neck at a 45 degree angle they said, was the most benefitial for hours of continuous work.
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