2005 ~ 80 ~ ISBN 0-9738181-0-7
In the past two decades, disability management (DM) has come into its own as a profession and as a viable workplace strategy to reduce the human and economic cost of disability. Twenty years ago when a worker suffered a serious injury or illness, whether workplace-related or not, the worker would go off work and, if lucky, collect insurance benefits but would soon be forgotten about by the workplace.
Rising unemployment rates for persons with disabilities, falling hiring rates, both across Canada and around the world, as well as increasing statutory obligations under duty to accommodate legislation, have led to the development of new approaches, which tend to place greater emphasis on employer responsibility for maintaining the employment relationship for workers who suffer a disabling condition. In addition to increased statutory obligations, employers are also faced with rising financial costs associated with workers compensation, short-term and long-term disability coverage.
Jurisdictions around the world have tackled this challenge in a variety of different approaches; some by imposing federal reintegration obligations on employers, others introducing premium incentive schemes within the framework of their workers compensation systems, while still others have strengthened broadly based accommodation legislation.
These various economic, social and statutory initiatives have led to a range of employer responses designed to meet some or all of the objectives in terms of combining a reduction of the economic and social cost of disabilities with fulfilling legal expectations.
The examples presented in this publication, Weyerhaeuser Company Canada and Ford Motor Company Germany, operating in radically different industries but facing strikingly similar challenges, whether in Europe or North America, have identified a DM process in complete isolation from each other yet exhibiting very similar program features and social and economic outcomes.
In the case of Weyerhaeuser, the organization faced a challenge reflective of today’s global economic competitive environment whereby it had merged with two organizations operating different disability benefit systems and trying to create a consistent company approach. The company had been able to substantially reduce the incidence of injury, illness and disability; however, the duration of absence and lost days had substantially increased. In the space of two years, their redesigned DM program succeeded in reducing the duration of claims by 47 percent, saving the company more than $4 million in workers’ compensation costs.
In Ford’s case, another familiar situation where badly needed capital investments were contingent upon showing a most favourable cost structure. They were faced with the possibility of letting go some 500 long-term “disabled” workers unless they could somehow be accommodated when the plant’s new assembly line started up. By carefully analyzing the workers’ abilities and job profiles, the majority of these workers were able to return to productive work resulting in substantial reductions in insurance costs.
While the two case studies presented here may not necessarily be the “best” examples of programs in today’s workplace, both are examples of successfully tackling a major workplace concern and ultimately saving millions of dollars while dramatically reducing the number of workers on long-term disability or social assistance. It is our hope that the two stories will inspire other workplaces to implement or enhance their DM programs.
Price : $35
