Category Archives: Workplace

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Weighing In on Stand-Up Workstations and Exercise Balls

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Stand-up workstations and exercise balls used for sitting in place of an office chair are gaining popularity.

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This has been fueled by reports of workers at Google, Facebook and other companies trading in their chairs to stand, or bounce, while working. They cite studies of the harm that hours of sitting can do.

Even here at the RIMS office several employees prefer sitting (or bouncing) on exercise balls to the familiar rolling desk chair, or working at a stand-up desk. Risk professionals have long been discussing the merits and downsides of these two popular choices.

But are these alternative ergonomic preferences really that beneficial?

Recently in an online discussion, some members of the RIMS Opis community said they were not in favor of exercise balls as ergonomic solutions. A risk manager in Oregon stated it bluntly: “Exercise balls should be limited to fitness programs.

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Your [workers comp] will own the injury if an employee slips off the ball and hits [his or her] head or has a soft tissue injury from the fall.” Several other commenters agreed that the balls are unstable and their use is discouraged or officially prohibited.

A CEO said: “While great for encouraging engagement of your core muscles during exercise, [balls] are not good for sitting at a workstation and in fact, research shows, increase your risk of ergonomic injury.”

In fact, some research has found their benefits negligible. A study of 28 subjects found that exercise or chair balls offer no advantages over a traditional workplace chair. According to a study by BioMed Central:

Results:

The results showed no significant difference with regard to spinal curvature between seating types. Initial sitting curvature was found to increase significantly over 30 minutes in both the desk chair and stability ball. In addition the results of the usability questionnaire showed a significant difference in three of the eight questions, in favor of the desk chair.

Conclusion:

No benefits were found through sitting on a stability ball over that of a desk chair in prolonged sitting as both seating types were found to replicate a poor sitting position through a kyphosed [outwardly curved spine] and slumped posture. The clinical implications of this study serve to benefit any healthcare professional considering use of the stability ball as a replacement desk chair.

In another online comment, a Missouri risk manager suggested a compromise, elaborating that while his organization allows their use, “They cannot be free-standing balls… they must be part of a chair ball with wheels and a seat backing.”

Stand-up desks received more positive feedback. Several risk professionals cited research equating excessive sitting and sedentary lifestyles with serious chronic health problems. A number of commenters shared anecdotes about how stand-up workstations have helped employee health issues. Several users noted that in their newly renovated, or soon-to-be-renovated, offices, stand-up workstations are de rigueur.

Who pays for these workstations? Most who commented said, or implied, that their companies foot the bill for stand-up desks if an employee requests them. Most seem willing to make the investment based on reports that providing ergonomic options can reduce workers comp claims.

Not all are sold on the benefits, however. A commenter from Chicago said, “As odd as it sounds, stand-up desks may not be wholly safe…. People get tired and fall down using them. And there is no confirmation standing is less stressful than sitting. Folks very quickly started to complain of sore hips, knees, feet and spines.”

A Virginia risk manager shared the wisdom of moderation and the middle ground, saying, “While sitting is bad—and the motive for getting a standing desk—standing all day can cause myriad lower back, leg and feet issues. It would be similar to what risk managers at grocery stores have to deal with their cashiers on their feet all day. Interspersing standing with sitting is key.”

Some researchers agree with this conclusion. A New York Times article reported that 15 minutes per hour at a standing workstation is recommended over standing all day.

Fraud Incidents Rise in 2016, Kroll Finds

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Reports of fraud have risen in the past year. In fact, incidences of every type of fraud have reached double-digit levels, according to the Kroll Global Fraud & Risk Report 2016/2017. Overall, 82% of executives reported falling victim to at least one instance of fraud in the past year, up from 75% in 2015.

Theft of physical assets remained the most prevalent type of fraud in the last year, reported by 29% of respondents, up 7 percentage points from 22% of respondents in the last survey. Kroll reported that vendor, supplier, or procurement fraud (26%) and information theft, loss, or attack (24%) were the next two most common types of fraud cited, each up 9 percentage points year-over-year.

Kroll found that most threats come from within an organization, with current and ex-employees being the most frequently cited perpetrators of fraud, cyber, and security incidents over the past 12 months. External parties were also identified as active perpetrators.

In the United States:
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• On the complexity of fraud risks, the majority (60%) of executives who reported suffering fraud incidents identified some combination of perpetrators, including current employees, ex-employees, and third parties, with almost half (49%) involving all three groups.

• Almost four in 10 respondents (39%) who were victims experienced fraud perpetrated by a junior employee, 30% by senior or middle management, 27% by ex-employees, and 27% by freelance/temporary employees. Agents and/or intermediaries were also cited by 27% of respondents as involved in carrying out fraud.

• Insiders were cited as the main perpetrators of fraud, and also identified as the most likely to discover it. Almost half (44%) of respondents said that recent fraud had been discovered through a whistleblowing system and 39% said it had been detected through an internal audit.

Among anti-fraud measures, the widest adoption—reported by 82% of executives surveyed—focused on information, such as IT security and technical countermeasures. The converse of the finding is concerning: nearly one out of five respondents (18%) have not adopted such protections.
kroll fraud risk

According to the report:

80% of respondents in the U.S. experienced fraud in the past 12 months, an increase of 5 percentage points on the previous year. This figure is 2 percentage points below the reported global average of 82%. Intellectual property (IP) theft, piracy, or counterfeiting is a clear threat to companies in the U.S., which was reported by just over a quarter (27%) of U.S. participants, almost twice the reported global average. The U.S. was the only country where IP theft was the most common type of fraud reported. Information theft, loss, or attack was the second most mentioned type of fraud impacting companies in the U.S., followed by conflicts of interest in the management team. The main perpetrators of fraud were reported to be insiders. Where fraud had been discovered, 36% of executives in the U.S. reported that junior employees were responsible, and 32% named senior or middle management. Respondents in the U.S. were most likely to have adopted IT security measures, followed by financial controls and asset security as their top three ways to mitigate fraud risk. In the U.S., the most common way fraud was detected was not through a whistle-blower, as it was for most of the other countries surveyed, but through an internal audit. Nearly half (49%) of U.S. participants said it was the most common detection mechanism.

Moving Employees Safely is Critical in Oil & Gas Industry

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oil-rigs
The oil, gas and marine industry has always teetered on the brink of unfortunate circumstances. Oil rigs and oil tankers, by the very nature of their massive size and exposure to the elements, are susceptible to myriad dangers. And when those risks materialize, the safety of the men and women operating these maritime behemoths must take top priority.

In the case of a hurricane, energy giant Shell Oil says it begins evacuating non-essential personnel from offshore platforms and drilling rigs, starting with sites closest to the hurricane’s anticipated path. Like Shell, most of the larger oil companies have evacuation down to a science, particularly during hurricane season. In many cases the evacuation from oil rigs or oil tankers is highly manageable, with no more than a few dozen people having to be transported at times. Thus, in most cases, the evacuees can simply grab a taxi, book themselves into a hotel room, or make other similar accommodations.

But what happens when the evacuation is so immense that you are suddenly relocating thousands of workers to the nearest mainland?

In October 2014, with the threat of a cyclone ready to batter the Gulf of Mexico, Mexico’s state oil company, Pemex, evacuated 15,000 workers from more than 60 platforms in the Gulf of Mexico—all with the need to be transported and lodged.

Anticipating worst case scenarios is a prerequisite. Although travel by executives at the C-suite level in these types of companies is handled with the highest priority, to deal with the constant movement of lower-level workers, many companies enlist the services of travel management companies to coordinate getting personnel from land to rigs, tankers, drills and pipelines and back. This massive orchestration includes coordinating accommodations, lodging, weather alerts, translation services and other types of ticketing.

Certain industries, such as oil and gas, need to send employees to work in the world’s “hot zones.” According to a USA Today report, three Americans were among 38 workers killed in the 2013 siege of an Algerian gas plant in which Islamic terrorists used hostages as human shields after their attempted mass kidnapping for ransom went awry. Seven U.S. citizens survived the attack. This illustrates that the need to move crews swiftly isn’t always at the mercy of weather conditions. This is where a real-time knowledge of the current political climate is necessary, including the best exit points, and how to travel safely within those countries should the need to evacuate a facility arise.

Other times the challenge includes getting workers from a major airport to a remote location—perhaps where a helicopter undertakes the last leg of the trip out to the site. Oil and gas industry travelers also need to realize that the flight on a major airline to get into a somewhat unstable country isn’t the problem; it’s traveling within the country, where options are often very limited.

Fortunately, the recent boom in technology has helped make personnel travel safer, as they can now receive electronic alerts regarding risks such as natural catastrophes, labor strikes, and changes in flight schedules.

There is the potential for a number of problems to arise when operating these marine locations, both weather-related and man-made. And the cost of finding solutions to these situations can often be crippling and costly to a business, both in terms of valuable staff time wasted as well as the difficulty in finding the time or the resources to source viable, inexpensive travel alternatives.

Fed Program Initiates Life-Saving Training for Shootings, Terror Attacks

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The length of time victims wounded in school shootings and terror attacks must wait for help from an EMT could be minutes or hours—during which time they could bleed to death.

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This has happened in a number of cases, including a shooting at an Orlando nightclub in June, when a woman bled to death while waiting for help to arrive.

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These incidents have prompted the Department of Homeland Security’s Stop the Bleed campaign, a nationwide initiative to empower individuals to act quickly and save lives in emergency situations. Bystanders are asked to take simple steps to keep an injured person alive until medical care is available.

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Security guards, custodians, teachers and administrators are being trained at schools and other places to administer first aid until help arrives.

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Stony Brook University Hospital’s trauma center is spearheading training for school districts and colleges across the country. According to the Associated Press:

At a recent training session, paramedics and doctors brought in fake body parts—blood spurting from the wounds—to show staffers of a Long Island school district how to tie tourniquets and pack open wounds with whatever they have.

“Seconds matter. It really can be minutes when you can lose your life,” said Dr. James Vosswinkel, the chief of trauma and emergency surgery at Stony Brook University Hospital, who led the training.

Doctors emphasized that in the critical seconds after an attack it’s important for teachers and other school staff to stay calm and begin assessing injuries. Teachers learned to apply tourniquets in case a student is shot in the arms or legs—using T-shirts or belts, if necessary—and to stick anything they can to pack wounds in the torso.

Stony Brook doctors have reached out to local schools to offer the training, but are looking to expand the program as part of a federal Department of Homeland Security initiative to other schools, colleges and police departments across the country.

“Nobody should die from preventable hemorrhage,” Vosswinkel said.