A new era for managing health and wellbeing

Impaired health costs the industry around £800m a year. By reporting, monitoring, and benchmarking health and wellbeing data, industry can share best practice and make better health-based investment decisions.

Noodhir Sobun
Senior System Safety Engineer, Risk and Safety Intelligence, RSSB

Employee health is expected to be heavily impacted by an ageing workforce, rising chronic disease, and ill health. These factors will significantly increase the health and wellbeing (H&W) cost if there is no shift to more proactive management. In a 2014 report, RSSB estimated a total annual cost of impaired health, combining sickness absence and presenteeism, of around £790m. These high costs offer clear opportunities for rail to make savings.Cross-industry data collection, monitoring, and public reporting has driven safety improvements within rail for many years. The Office of Rail and Road (ORR) has supported a similar data-led approach for H&W with shared key performance indicators (KPIs), encouraging industry to take a similar approach as we do for safety to unlock comparable improvements.

_{^{ORR has been calling for shared industry reporting of health data for some time. We are delighted to endorse this suite of common health performance indicators, which represents a landmark step towards this goal.}}

_{^{Ian Prosser CBE}}_{^{, HM Chief Inspector of Railways, ORR Director of Railway Safety}}

Currently, with inconsistent and incomplete data, rail is not equipped to manage employee health optimally. Factors such as an ageing workforce, rising chronic disease, and ill health will increase the H&W cost if more proactive management is not sought. To make the improvements needed, more proactive management of employee health is necessary. RSSB’s Health and Wellbeing Performance Management System is an innovative cross-industry dashboard for reporting, monitoring, and benchmarking H&W in rail. It facilitates health-based investment decisions that consider the wider safety context and competing calls on budget. It also supports companies in managing employee health more proactively to achieve better results in terms of staff absence, morale, and productivity. The cross-industry dashboard avoids duplication of effort, ensures that companies have access to the best approach, and prevents future rework. It also supports the implementation of the Health and Wellbeing Index (HWI), a measure based on the same concept as the fatalities and weighted injuries (FWI).

The award-winning HWI helps measure and monitor employees’ health and wellbeing to understand and reduce the causes that compromise it.

The next stepsWe have completed phase 1, which involved recommending health KPIs and gathering technical and user requirements. Phase 2, which will see the development and testing of the prototype with the pilot user community, is in progress and will conclude in June 2024.Phase 3 will see rollout to industry after June 2024.

Previews of the Health and Wellbeing Performance Management System: The Health and Wellbeing Dashboard

The Health and Wellbeing Performance Management System: Health and Wellbeing Dashboard

The Health and Wellbeing Dashboard: Data on the top 10 industry self-reported sickness absence reasons

^{Participant’s Perspective}

_{^{It is fundamental for businesses aiming to improve employees’ wellbeing to be able to benchmark their data with other businesses, within and beyond the rail industry. We (Siemens Rail Automation) have had a well-structured Health & Wellbeing Strategy in place since 2015 and although the health trends we monitor so far seem to be work in our favour, it’s vital for us to understand where we stand in comparison with other business, what is it that we do well, and why is it working better or worse than others. It’s a great opportunity for all the business taking part in this study, not only because we can measure the outcomes of our efforts against other businesses in our industry, but also because we can seize the opportunity to share good practices and influence employee health across our industry, not just within our business.}}

_{^{Nayia Solea,}}_{^{Occupational Health & Wellbeing Specialist, Siemens Rail Automation}}

^{Industry Support – Health Economics Group}

_{^{We are delighted that this work is now underway. Being able to benchmark basic health-related metrics will enable rail companies to better judge how well their staff are compared to their peer group. Perhaps more importantly, it will also enable management teams and health professionals within the companies to make more informed decisions on where best to focus time and resource.}}

_{^{Dr Bridget Juniper,}}_{^{Director at Work and Well-Being Ltd and Chair of RSSB Health Economics Group}}

^{University of Birmingham – Benchmarking Team}

_{^{Benchmarking is one of the most common and effective management techniques for improving performance—in safety, commercial, the environment and of course Health and Wellbeing. A key feature of quality benchmarking is being able to place reliance on the data that is developed from it, so that managers can make well informed decisions and defend them if necessary. The University of Birmingham’s Rail Research activity includes many benchmarking activities covering safety, operations, sustainability and engineering. In all of these, the application of academic rigour, together with industry and domain experience, is critical to the outcomes that are achieved. Being involved in the design and development of an active Health and Wellbeing initiative within the rail sector is very exciting for us.}}

_{^{Anson Jack}}_{^{, Professor of International Railway Benchmarking}}

Want to know more?

For information about RSSB’s Health and Wellbeing Performance Management System, contact Noodhir Sobun.

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