The statistics behind occupational safety & health and employee wellbeing

Posted 5 years ago

One of the most important factors that can directly impact the success of an organisation is how it looks after its workforce. Many organisations understand that by having a core focus on health, safety, and wellbeing, they’ll gain a competitive advantage, mainly through the fact that they’ll have a more productive and present workforce.

However, as great as it is to have an advantage in financial performance, employers do actually have a moral duty to take care of their workforce. Unfortunately, though it would seem, too many employers are neglecting Health & Safety and Wellbeing…

Three quarters of businesses say they have faced barriers in investing in health and safety for all members of the organisation, most commonly because of a lack of interest in the management team.

IOSH Opinium, 2017

IOSH has recently released ‘The Healthy Profit’ – a campaign that highlights how investments in safety, health and wellbeing are giving businesses a cutting edge.

IOSH found that In the UK alone, workplace injury and illness costs businesses roughly £15 billion every year. This is an outrageous figure, especially when you consider the following statistics:

– For every €1 invested in occupational safety and health, organisations can see an average of a €2.20 return.

– In fact, around 40% of medium-sized business leaders said that sickness absence has had a detrimental impact on their organisation’s productivity.

– The number of fines exceeding £1 million rose from three in 2015 to 19 in 2016.

Mental Wellbeing Statistics

Just as important as occupational safety & health, organisations have a duty to protect the mental wellbeing of their workforce and in doing this, they can also see an improvement in financial performance. This is backed up by the following statistics:

– Mental health problems cost an estimated £1,300 for every employee in the UK economy.

– For every £1 invested in the wellbeing of employees, organisations can see an average of £4.20 return.

– Better mental health support in the workplace can save UK businesses up to £8 billion per year.

Finding the solution

Obviously, there is still a lot of room for improvement among UK organisations to go above and beyond the standards set for occupational safety & health and employee wellbeing.

Whether this is achieved by completing more thorough risk assessments, hiring qualified health & safety staff, having the correct systems and procedures in place, there are lots of simple ways to better your organisation.

One simple yet extremely effective method is training staff with quality eLearning. Our engaging Health & Safety and HR Compliance Training courses offer fantastic value to your workforce, providing them with quality information needed for their role and helping your organisation towards legislative compliance.

With over 100 courses in our ever-expanding library, including our IOSH Approved Fire Awareness and Manual Handling training, there are courses for everyone!

Claim a no-obligation free trial to any of our courses today!