Article 1: Positive Psychology: A Primer (and Challenge)

Article 2: Positive Psychology as an Emerging Construct in Disability Management

Article 3: Positive Outcomes Following Physical Disability

Article 4: Gratitude for the Disability Manager

Article 5: Disability Management Parallels Positive Psychology in Work Organizations

Positive Psychology: A Primer (and Challenge)

by: Jasen Walker, Ed.D., Fred Heffner, Ed.D., and Kim McGrath, B.A.

     CEC Associates, Inc., Valley Forge, PA 19482

Introduction:

Martin E. P. Seligman, Ph.D., the past-president of the American Psychological Association is largely credited with founding the Positive Psychology movement.  Offering a radical departure from behavioral sciences that focus on “dis-ease,” members of the positive psychological research community seek to find specific ways to improve the lives, communities, and social institutions, including school and the workplace.  In essence, Positive Psychology is the study of human behaviors that lead to the “pursuit of happiness” and the “good life.”

Seligman and other positive psychologists study the nature of constructs such as flow, that is, how people can become so engaged in work or play that all else seems to disappear.  Flow is said to be a key to creative productivity and problem solving.  Positive psychologists are studying hope, optimism, gratitude, resilience, and a myriad of other human phenomena that have the potential to change how we think, feel, and behave generally in our lives, including the workplace.

Within the framework of Positive Psychology, Dr. Seligman and Christopher Peterson, Ph.D., have identified 24 character strengths found in any particular individual.  Divided among the six virtues of wisdom and knowledge, courage, humanity, justice, temperance, and transcendence, these character strengths act as a system of values to guide the new psychology.  Below, we present a summary of each of the six virtues, with specific highlights from the book Character Strengths and Virtues, the Handbook and Classification, authored by Seligman and Peterson.

Wisdom and Knowledge:

Character Strengths: Creativity, Curiosity, Open-Mindedness, Love of Learning, Perspective

This virtue includes positive traits that relate to the utilization of acquired information, and the authors define it as “knowledge hard fought for, and then used for good.”  The strengths falling under this virtue are considered cognitive in nature.  The authors note that there is evidence that “making more life changes, particularly during the thirties life transition, appears to have a positive affect on the development of wisdom.”  However, they also acknowledge that wisdom and knowledge mean more than just the number of books read: “Perhaps it has something to do with living through hardship, emerging a better person….”  In any case, acquirement of these strengths takes time. 

Courage:

Character Strengths: Bravery, Persistence, Integrity, Vitality

According to the authors, courage is the will to accomplish goals even in the face of adversity, be it an internal or external factor.  Strengths included in this virtue are considered corrective as they “counteract some difficulty…some temptation…or some motivation that needs to be checked or rechanneled.”  They even commented that courage is not limited to an external act of bravery; rather, inner acts, emotions, and decisions can be deemed courageous.  They point to Cicero’s definition of courage as one they chose to model: “Courage is the deliberate facing of dangers and bearing of toils.” 

Humanity:

Character Strengths: Love, Kindness, Social Intelligence

Considered to be positive traits found in caring relationships, character strengths of humanity reflect altruistic or “prosocial” behavior.  People with these strengths will show kindness even when it will not be returned, and they do more than what is only fair.  Most relationships in this virtue are interpersonal by nature, which is why love falls under this category.  The difference between strengths of humanity and those of justice is that the former thrives on “one-to-one” relationships.  The latter, strengths of justice, thrives on a “one-to-many” type of relationship.

Justice:

Character Strengths: Citizenship, Fairness, Leadership

Justice is that which makes life fair.  The authors comment it is the notion of equity.  Citizenship contains the values of social responsibility, loyalty, and teamwork.  As noted above, strengths of justice are strengths among many, not just between individuals.

Temperance:

Character Strengths: Forgiveness and Mercy, Humility and Modesty, Prudence, Self-Regulation

This strength is that which protects us from excess.  While the initial thought may be overindulgence in eating or drinking, excess can also refer to the concepts of hatred, short-term pleasure, and arrogance.  Strengths of temperance do not cause the indulgence to end, but it tempers the activity from reaching an excessive point.  The authors point out that courage is not included in these strengths because, unlike courage, these strengths lead individuals toward behaving in positive ways regardless of temptation.  In conclusion, they remark that temperance is “a form of self-denial that is ultimately generous to the self or others – prudence and humility are prime examples.”

Transcendence:

Character Strengths: Appreciation of Beauty and Excellence, Gratitude, Hope, Humor, Spirituality

As the connection to something higher, it is important to note that “what is transcendent does need to be sacred but does not need to be divine.”  Each character strength gives individuals the ability to connect with the larger universe, which can inspire awe and hope.  For example, the authors claim, “Appreciation of beauty is a strength that connects someone directly to excellence.”

Conclusion:

Seligman and Peterson believe that “coherent resemblance” of these High Six virtues can be found across cultures.  In their words, “The higher-order meaning behind a particular core virtue will line up better with its cross-cultural counterpart than it will with any other core virtue….” 

Positive Psychology endeavors to elucidate the human factors, including virtues and character strengths, that lead to the “good life.”  In this set of CEU articles, we assert that people with occupationally significant impairments, mental and/or physical, still have the right and capacity to pursue such a life.  We begin this series of papers with what Seligman and Peterson define as six virtues and 24 character strengths with cross-cultural value.  We argue that vocational counselors and disability management program directors could enrich their work and enhance their services to others by integrating positive psychology concepts in their approaches with clients and employees.  After all, everyone has the right to pursue and experience happiness.

We offer this summary of strengths and virtues not with any specific career change or vocational rehabilitation applications in mind.  We simply invite the reader to consider the constructs presented and challenge rehabilitation personnel to greater participation among those helping professionals investigating various aspects of Positive Psychology .

References:

Peterson, C., & Seligman, M. E. (2004). Character Strengths and Virtues: A Handbook and
     Classification. New York: Oxford University Press.

Positive Psychology as an Emerging Construct in Disability Management

by: Jasen Walker, Ed.D., and Fred Heffner, Ed.D.

     CEC Associates, Inc., Valley Forge, PA 19482

Transformational Leadership:

Just as the development of Positive Psychology requires visionary leadership (which has manifested itself especially in the contributions of Martin E. P. Seligman, Ph.D., and his colleagues), the evolution of how injured workers are treated in the workplace also requires visionary leadership.  In the early stages of “managing” the injured worker, the employer encouraged the lost-time employee to remain on workers’ compensation (WC) and, in effect, leave the company.  When employees took to the idea of not having to work again by staying on WC, the employer, in these early efforts, sought out third party providers to find an alternative employment outside the company.  These so-called rehabilitation services were simply the employer or insurance carrier’s effort to resolve claims, usually by following the mandates of a particular workers’ compensation jurisdiction.

In the article “Functions and Knowledge Domains for Disability Management Practice: A Delphi Study,” the authors state, “…traditional rehabilitation services often fail to develop active, equal, and valued partnerships with employees in implementing the rehabilitation process” (Currier, Chan, Berven, Habeck, & Taylor, 2001).  Incidentally, one of the authors of that article, Rochelle V. Habeck, a disability management consultant who once taught at Michigan State University, conducted research on and wrote about the significant difference between traditional “Rehabilitation” and “Disability Management.”  Habeck found that where the leadership representing employers had been progressive, i.e., “transformative,” and where companies had fewer labor-management conflicts, there were fewer disability claims.

In Positive Psychology, the proactive approach to assisting human beings is based on strengthening assets and preventing as opposed to treating illness or dysfunction.  Beyond that, Positive Psychology seeks to not only study positive emotion and identify positive personality traits (i.e., character traits and virtues) but also help build positive institutions, including strong families and viable workplaces.  As opposed to the failed traditional rehabilitation services referenced by Currier et al., Disability Management sought to develop and apply methods of prevention and early intervention as basic elements to keep the employee population safe and well and, if necessary, assist impaired employees in navigating effectively through the quagmire of the disability-claims process, the medical treatment process, and the emotionally-charged personal (family) process to occupational recovery.  Disability Management Programs (DMP) became integrated not only in terms of benefits but also in terms of human capital strategies for keeping people productive.  State-of-the-art DMPs now advocate for prevention and early intervention through integrating Accident Prevention and Safety Programs, Wellness Initiatives, Employee Assistance Programs, Leadership Effectiveness Training, Conflict Resolution, and Mediation Training as well as applying similarly positive resources before and after lost time resulting from employee injury or illness.

Transformational leaders embrace concepts central to positive psychological thinking and organizational well-being.  Company heads and disability managers now recognize that individual employees do not stumble onto happiness, well being and productivity.  They actively seek it out in work environments that enable not lost time and occupational disability but opportunities to experience work-life balance, positive emotion, and flow. 

Work-Life Balance:

Originally, employers recognized no connection between the employee’s workplace responsibilities and anything else in the employee’s life.  As work intensified in terms of its competitive nature and skilled people became more “valuable,” employers were urged to balance their expectations of their employees for loyalty and dedication with the recognition that taking external pressures (especially family pressure) into consideration and designing accommodations for that reality significantly improved worklife effectiveness and productivity.  The Family and Medical Leave Act was promulgated, in part, on the notion that one’s personal life had to have some degree of balance with job commitments.

Losing interest and even burnout are directly attributable to increased workplace and familial stress, and work frustrations are real for blue-collar workers as well as management-level employees.  In fact, the stress is heightened as both workplace and family pressures combine.  Stress-derived injuries and subsequent disability claims continue to rise, and the workplace is often identified as the crucible for the onset of stress related disorders.

Well-designed and integrated DMPs have allowed employers to assist employees in better managing life’s pressures.  The gamut of strategies developed in state-of-the-art DMPs, such as effective Employee Assistance Programs, the use of flexible hours, job modifications, job sharing, engaging employees in the decision-making processes that most affect them, and  transition-to-work methods are now part of the human resource strategies mix in most well-managed companies.

Emotional Contagion in Groups:

Emotional contagion has been shown to play a significant role in work-group dynamics.  A better understanding of the conditions and concepts of emotional contagion can lead to greater insight into and understanding of employees’ workplace behavior.  Recently, the concept of emotional contagion has taken a role in the formation of effective DMPs.

Emotional contagion in groups was first researched by Sigal G. Barsade of the Yale School of Management in 2001.  The concept can be defined as “a process in which a person or group influences the emotions or behavior of another person or group through the conscious or unconscious induction of emotion states and behavioral attitudes” (Schoenewolf 1990). 

The results of Barsade’s research confirms that people do not live on emotional islands but rather as group members experience moods at work.  These moods ripple out and, in the process, influence not only other group members’ emotions but their group dynamics and individual cognitions, attitudes, and behaviors (e.g., interpersonal conflict) as well.  Thus, emotional contagion, through its direct and indirect influence on employee and work team emotions, judgments, and behaviors, can lead to subtle but significant ripple effects in groups and organizations.  Whereas positive emotional contagion can enhance productivity, negative emotional contagion can reduce it.

Negative moods are highly infectious, and as a result, employers are learning under the prodding of DMP innovators to teach recognition and protection skills.  Perhaps the most important skill to help contain contagion is teaching employees to achieve and maintain independence from “group think.”  Awareness is certainly a start, but the key is active prevention and early intervention.

Leadership Effectiveness Training, Managerial Mediation, and Conflict Resolution Skills development programs intend to go beyond awareness alone.  Unresolved conflict has been shown to be one of the most costly issues in the workplace.  A classic management study determined that 25% of the typical manager’s time is spent responding to conflict.  That figure rises to 30% for first line supervisors.  As noted, Habeck’s research has shown that management-labor strife leads to increased WC losses.  It has been estimated that a quarter of the management salary budget represents no small investment in shielding productive work from the destructive effects of conflict.  Leadership Effectiveness Training includes skill development in interpersonal communication, conflict resolution, and problem solving.  Transformational leaders invested in proactive disability management do not fear conflict but know how to prevent and effectively manage it.

Flow:

If employers could choose one attribute they would want in their employees, it would certainly be motivation.  Individuals who are highly motivated (and happy) generally experience satisfaction at work through an optimal mental state called “flow,” which was introduced to the world by a positive psychologist, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Director of the Quality of Life Center at Claremont Graduate University in California.  Flow is a single construct that distinguishes a regularly productive employee from one who is not as productive.

Csikszentmihalyi recognized that a person who is fully engaged (immersed) in what he or she is doing is energized by it.  This total immersion in the activity (e.g., the work process) reveals that one can experience high levels of satisfaction in challenging tasks that match skills.

With Csikszentmihalyi’s assistance, Disability Management professionals, supported by transformational leadership, can induce flow experiences.  Csikszentmihalyi identifies these experiences as:

1. Having clear goals.
2. Concentrating and focusing.
3. Having a distorted sense of time.
4. Receiving and analyzing feedback.
5. Balancing ability level and challenge.
6. Sensing control over the activity.
7. Finding the activity rewarding.
8. Being absorbed in the activity.

The Csikszentmihalyi concept of the value of flow is much broader than just a work process.  One can be deeply immersed in play or other leisure activities as well.  However, employers are constantly searching for ways to make their employees more productive, and flow was tailor-made for the workplace.

Job Modification/Job Accommodation:

In a well-established, proactive transition-to-work program, job modification, job accommodation, and job sharing can facilitate an injured employee’s return to work.  Job modification is the process of subtracting from, or adding to, a job description or transitional  work role while maintaining its essential functions.  “Essential Functions” is a primary concept of the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Job modification might include eliminating unessential lifting, changing hours, relocating a job within a particular work environment, or changing the job/transitional assignment in a manner that results in both employer satisfaction and employee success.  Transition-to-work programming, in general, is an effort to create a win-win outcome following lost-time injury or illness.  Jobs can be modified in terms of their physical demands, time allocation, environmental requirements, supervision, and in countless other ways that are a function of employer-employee joint (creative) problem-solving.  By creating transition-to-work assignments and modifying jobs, employers maintain a pathway for employees to return by rehabilitating themselves while at work.  Transition-to-work programs have replaced the self-limited paradigm of “light duty.”

Job accommodation is a specific method advanced by the collaborative effort between employer and employee to modify work or to accommodate the needs of an impaired employee so that the essential functions of the job may be carried out to the mutual satisfaction of both the employer and employee.  Job accommodation is not a new concept, but in 1990, the Americans with Disabilities Act advanced the practice of “reasonable accommodation” by making it mandatory that qualified individuals with disabilities be given the opportunity to begin or maintain work with reasonable accommodation.

The U.S. Department of Labor comments, “The process for making such accommodations is no different in principle than implementing workplace procedures designed to build productive work environments.  As with all such procedures, open lines of communication and clearly defined steps help to facilitate the process and achieve positive outcomes for both employers and employees.”  An excellent resource for job accommodations and assisting in the employment of individuals with disabilities is the Job Accommodation Network.

Conclusions

Disability managers and transformational leaders have the good fortune of Positive Psychology research, which parallels DMP development and empirically supports the commonsense conclusion that human beings have specific pathways to well being, happiness, and productivity.  These pathways are available to employers and employees in proactive work organizations that integrate not only insurance programs but human capital strategies to keep people at work, safe, engaged, creative, and too satisfied to become or remain disability claimants. 

References

Currier, K. F., Chan F., Berven, N. L., Habeck, R. H., &  Taylor, D. W. (2001, Spring).

            Functions and Knowledge for Disability Management Practice: A Delphi Study.

            Rehabilitation Counseling Bulletin, 44(3), 133.

Schoenewolf, G. (1990).  Emotional contagion: Behavior induction in individuals and groups.

            Modern Psychoanalysis, 15: 49-61.

Positive Outcomes Following Physical Disability

by: Jasen Walker, Ed.D., and Fred Heffner, Ed.D.

     CEC Associates, Inc., Valley Forge, PA 19482

As remarkable as it may seem, research has shown that “individuals who incur a physical disability may do more than ‘survive’ their condition; their resilience and clarity of purpose may result in greater resolve for pursuing personal goals” (Snyder 1998).   Those same individuals often attain “spiritual awareness and psychological adjustment that surpasses their previous level of adaptation” (Wright 1983).

Resilience after Loss of a Limb

The Landmine Survivors Network (LSN), a Washington, D.C., based agency created by and for survivors of landmine trauma, assists victims “to recover from trauma, reclaim their lives, and fulfill their human rights.”  This group, along with a coalition of agencies focused on the same issue, was a co-recipient of the 1997 Nobel Peace Prize and with its partners was responsible for the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty.  The Network provides workshops on disability laws and human rights around the world.

In 2004 LSN conducted a study “to determine factors that contribute to an individual’s recovery.”  The study “indicated that the survivor’s acceptance of limb loss and their state of psychological recovery were greatly influenced by the individual’s resilience characteristics [bolding added], social support, medical care, economic situation and societal attitudes toward people with disabilities.”

Among other facts, the study found that “personality dispositions, such as hardiness, may allow an individual to develop adaptive coping behaviors in response to traumatic stressors, thereby mitigating the development of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).”  Further, people who recovered psychologically from an accident “developed new coping strategies and ways of thinking that allowed them to address their new role in society, in their family, and in their work.”   Those who did better in the survival process described a conscious effort “to change their way of thinking to cope with their injuries and cited their own determination, perseverance, and positive thinking as important to their recovery.” 

The LSN study provides crucial guidance to rehabilitation professionals involved with those injured in workplace accidents.  The critical findings of the study show that while there are essential contributing factors to recovery from trauma, such as the level of medical care, societal acceptance, family supports, and the economics of the case, a significant aspect in the final analysis is the ability and determination of the injured individual to cope with the situation.  In essence, resilience is defined in the study as “determination, perseverance, and positive thinking.” 

Recognizing that some individuals responding to traumatic injury do better than others, rehabilitation professionals need to understand why that is and should do all they can to encourage these essential traits.  While we may not be able to teach all individuals to be resilient, we can certainly devise strategies to encourage it.

Resilience in the Workplace

In the workplace, there is a need to consider resilience from two different perspectives:

1.      Hiring employees who are resilient or at least training them to be proactively resilient to meet and surmount challenges as they arise

and,

2.      Working with employees who are dysfunctional in respect to returning to productivity post-trauma but who exhibit little or no willingness to do so.

The seminal work in promoting proactive resilience was done by Mary A. Steinhardt, Ed.D., of the University of Texas (Austin) in a project she developed for, and carried out with, Motorola.  The results of that study are titled “Transforming Stress into Resilience,” and they are published in the Journal for Quality and Participation, among other sources.  The premise of Steinhardt’s work is that employers are looking for employees who know how to take initiative without waiting to being told to do so and that in fact, this characteristic can be inculcated.  This approach starts with the reality that stressful conditions are inevitable but employees can be encouraged to react positively to them and overcome them. 

Ideally, employers will seek to hire applicants who test positive for resilience.  (For assessment tools on resilience, search the web for “resilience assessments.”)  Also, employers might consider the questionnaires on the Positive Psychology web site, especially the “Attributional Style Questionnaire.”  It is important to note that resilience is generally considered as going beyond coping or adapting to actually becoming stronger as the result of besting the stressful occurrence.

The second perspective on resilience in the workplace is a much more prevalent situation and much more difficult to address: how to incorporate the need to be resilient in a Disability Management Program (DMP) for the purpose of assisting employees to return to work after an injury or illness.

The reality is that most employers do not have operational DMPs, and few of those who do actually conduct prevention training at the level of sophistication of the Motorola program.  Still, dysfunctional or disability-prone employees also need assistance to recognize and overcome stressful situations at work.

Most frequently, employees who lack resilience manifest that deficit after they have been injured (at work or outside of work).  They may be extremely reluctant to return to work after the trauma.  Ground-breaking work addressing the specific issues of disability proneness and injured worker helplessness has been done by Jasen Walker, Ed.D., President of CEC Associates, Inc., in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania.  Dr. Walker’s work has led to his recommendations on shaping cost-effective DMPs.  Dr. Walker develops and tests evolving concepts of effective disability management in which injured worker helplessness and disability proneness are addressed and prevented.  These methods have been reported in The New Worker, the longest running newsletter of its kind, as well as in numerous articles in the relevant professional literature.

Dr. Walker’s work focuses on after-the-fact situations, for example, scenarios in which workers have not learned to be resilient and for various other reasons are having significant difficulty returning to work.  Unlike the beneficiaries of Steinhardt’s pre-stress and stress-avoidance skills, employees who are exhibiting stress following trauma and demonstrating an unwillingness to return to work require an entirely different set of interventions than those used in prevention training.

Preparing to Combat Injured Worker Helplessness

To succeed with employees who are reluctant to return to work, rehabilitation professionals need to consider and apply a range of strategies.  There are a number of causes for injured worker helplessness.  Obviously, one problem is that the impaired employee has low or no resilience to overcome the negatives.  Some of these negative thoughts or beliefs include:

·        being unable to accept the value of the return-to-work opportunity (the worker undervalues the positives of working),

·        enlarging the challenge to return to work (distorting/magnifying the negatives of the return),

·        having a low frustration threshold,

·        fearing disapproval or criticism, and

·        believing that he or she has no personal control or influence over outcomes.

To understand injured worker helplessness and disability proneness, rehabilitation professionals have to take into consideration critical concepts such as Explanatory  (Attributional) Style, Locus of Control, and Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs.

The first challenge to the rehabilitation professional is to understand the employee in terms of his or her Explanatory Style.  This term is used in psychology to signify how people explain causality to themselves and others; that is, how and why things happen.  Psychologists have shown that some people, pessimists, tend to blame themselves for negative events and believe that the negatives will persist.  Other people, optimists, tend to blame negative outcomes in their lives on the behavior of others and believe that these negatives are only temporary.  Moreover, pessimists typically think that bad outcomes represent what generally happens to them across events, and optimists believe that bad outcomes are specific to the situation.

Locus of Control is a fundamental principle in Attribution Theory (a basis for Explanatory Style) and is the psychological construct through which individuals place responsibility, choice, and control of events in their lives.  There are two ways to ascribe control: internal and external.  Individuals with internal control tend to attribute the outcomes of events in their lives as being under their own control, whereas individuals with external control attribute the outcomes of events to external circumstances. 

It is essential for rehabilitation professionals to have these cognitive-behavioral constructs in mind when working with injured employees resisting return to work.  There are test instruments available for both Explanatory Style and Locus of Control.  The “Attributional Style Questionnaire” (ASQ) is used to determine Explanatory Style and optimism; the “Rotter I-E Scale” is commonly used to determine an individual’s Locus of Control orientation.  (At least one version of a Rotter Scale is available free on the internet: www.Ballarat.edu.au).

Another paradigm professionals may wish to consider when working to strengthen an individual’s resilience is Maslow’s “Hierarchy of Needs.”  The subtitle of the Hierarchy is “A Theory of Human Motivation.”  What is involved here, then, is how to understand the “motivation” that resists return to productivity and independence through work.

At its simplest, the Hierarchy consists of five levels of “needs.”  The highest level is “Self-Actualization.”  Being resilient may presume that the individual has achieved a sustainable level of both self-esteem and regard for others.  Maslow’s levels are illustrated as a pyramid with the most basic need on the bottom and the most developed level at the apex:

                                                1. Self-Actualization

                                                2. Esteem

                                                3. Social

                                                4. Safety

                                                5. Physiological

It is highly unlikely that an individual who does not derive self-esteem from work and a concomitant desire to succeed occupationally will have the resilience to overcome the challenge of disabling impairment.  The most important method of understanding at which level the injured employee is operating is through a well-conducted assessment by an experienced rehabilitation counselor or psychologist.

In Maslow’s theory, achieving any one level is dependent upon having realized the sequenced lower levels.  If the goal of the rehabilitation counselor is to assist the client to achieve greater self-esteem through a return to work, the counselor will be well served to understand at which Maslow level the client was generally functioning before the injury.    Then, the optimal task is to identify the impediments for a return to work based on “need” and address specific ways to overcome those impediments. 

Transition to Work: The Framework Needed to Work with Employees Resisting a Return to Work

The dominant conclusion of the LSN study was that those who do better in “the survival process” describe a conscious effort “to change their way of thinking to cope with their injuries.”  They also specifically reference “their own determination, perseverance, and positive thinking as important to their recovery.”

In vocational rehabilitation, the traditional method of dealing with injured employees was  either to outsource them (find a job for them with another employer) or, at best, to provide them with “light duty” assignments.  Light duty often meant returning the employee to the company but providing meaningless chores for them to do.  No effort was made to rehabilitate the worker while attempting to maintain their level of self-esteem.  In some cases, of course, the injury could be eventually resolved through medical rehabilitation, including physical therapy and work hardening.  However, in cases where the resistance was the worker’s learned helplessness or another psychological factor as opposed to a physical one, the solution was simply some light-duty activity or radically different outplacement.

When DMPs began to replace light duty with a “Transition-to-Work” approach, new opportunities presented themselves to introduce resilience-building activities. Whereas “light-duty” assignments typically demean workers, a Transition-to-Work maximizes post-injury potential, reduces the incidence of helplessness, and facilitates resilience.

Transition-to-Work (TTW) is an incremental process designed to involve the worker with appropriately sequenced activities to strengthen both the physical and psychological needs of the injured worker.  Materials to guide the process have been developed and are available from CEC Associates, among other sources.

The key to mitigating injured worker helplessness is to place recovering employees in a TTW program so that the rehabilitation counselor has the time to assess the nature of the resistance and apply remedial concepts.  All this occurs while the employee is being productively engaged in meaningful work, albeit in incremental steps.

Can Resilience be Taught?

Although all employers instruct employees in learning job-related skills, most employers do not perceive themselves as teachers.  They insist that the public schools (and even colleges) are responsible for teaching, and most feel that the schools are not doing a good job of it.

In life, and perhaps especially in work, there is no more fundamental skill than resilience.  People who can overcome adversity will fare better in life than those who cannot.  In the workplace, employees are constantly being challenged to overcome some adversity: a supervisor’s reprimand, disparagement by a colleague, frustration in learning a new skill, failure to meet a quota, etc.  The irreducible fact is that resilient employees will carry greater benefits for the employer than those who are not.

The question becomes one of how employers can address this issue for their benefit and profit.  The starting point for employers who recognize the benefits of resilience and choose to address the issue is to make every individual employee aware of the benefits of resilience and what the specific features of possessing it are.  Employees should be given a brief list of factors that distinguish the resilient from the less resilient.  That list will include, at minimum:

Resilient people:

·        view the world in optimistic and hopeful ways;

·        have self-esteem and feel appreciated by the people that are significant to them;

·        are able to, and do, set goals and expectations for themselves;

·        manifest self-discipline;

·        take responsibility for their actions;

·        can solve problems and make decisions; and

·        view mistakes, hardships, and obstacles as challenges to confront and overcome.

Employers who choose to do so can, over time and on an on-going basis, introduce motivators.  For example: 

·        reinforcing responsibility can be achieved by requiring, or at minimum encouraging a specific, measurable contribution by the employee;

·        offering encouragement and positive feedback;

·        challenging individuals to solve a specific problem;

·        discussing a mistake frankly and with understanding; and

·        requiring individuals to set and document measurable objectives.

Some Ways to Build Resilience in Those Who Are Not Resilient:

Stressful events happen to everybody.  We cannot change that reality.  But we can change how we respond to adverse events.  We can change an adverse reality by changing the focus of our thinking from the past (the event has already occurred and there is nothing we can do about it) to the present (what can we do about it now?) to the future (how can I manage or prevent the same type of occurrence?).

Employers can present the basics of resilience and confidence-building by helping their employees to think through the following concepts:

·        People who seem to do better than most on rising above adversity have goals for what they want to achieve in their lives.  If you have a goal (or goals), remind yourself of what they are.  If you have goals, bring them to the forefront and rededicate yourself to achieving them.  If you don’t have goals, now is the perfect time to set some.

·        Be decisive about what you do going forward.  If your first need is to set goals, identify some professional help that can assist you to set goals and then write them down.

·        Teach yourself to be positive about yourself.  In the world of psychology, there is something new happening.  Psychologists are now fostering something they call “Positive Psychology.”  They think that rather than teach doctors and psychologists how to address and correct problems, they should teach individuals how to avoid problems by being positive.

·        Try to improve your personal life.  What can you do to improve your living conditions?  Join a group in your neighborhood.  This not only gives you something to do but, more importantly, will get you in touch with new friends. 

·        It is good to rely on others, but you need to give equal time to relying on yourself, too.

·        Step up and volunteer to do something.  Do what?  Plan, be positive, learn new skills, and manage your feelings.

The key to adjustment following the onset of a disabling health condition is directly related to the Locus of Control orientation the individual brings to the situation.  Those with some measure of internal Locus of Control report less distress than those with expectations of external assistance.  Further, disabled individuals who have mastered and possess problem-solving skills have positive attitudes about resolving their own problems and are at once “more assertive, more psychosocially mobile, more accepting of their disability, and less depressed than their counterparts who lack these skills” (Elliott, 1999).

The strands of research here have been specifically culled to serve our premise that an impairment, however severe, does not necessarily equate to a work disability.  Nonetheless, this research is a valid basis from which to extrapolate some lessons for disability management in the workplace. 

There was a time in vocational rehabilitation when an impairment meant excuse from further work or, at best, an assignment to “light duty.”  During these formative years of DMPs, medical doctors determined whether a worker was “disabled” and could therefore continue on lost time disability benefits for the rest of his or her life.  Now, in quality DMPs, trained Vocational Disability/Evaluation professionals in collaboration with the employer and employee determine the degree to which the employee is disabled with or without accommodation. 

With the advent of Positive Psychology, researchers have examined the literature for outcomes associated with physical disability to determine if, in fact, physical trauma essentially always translates to negative results.  The finding that physical trauma does not necessarily preclude meaningful work is an important message for those creating and operating DMPs in the workplace.  When Disability Managers learn to recognize the state of mind and motivation of the impaired worker, they will be more prepared to facilitate recovery during an adjustment period and aptly apply transition-to-work methodology to the case.

References:

Aitken, S. & Morgan, J. (1999 January/February). How Motorola promotes good health.

            The Journal for Quality and Participation.

Elliott, T.R., Kurylo, M. & Rivera, P. (2005).  Positive growth following acquired physical disability.

          Handbook of Positive Psychology (pp. 687-699). New York: Oxford University Press.

Snyder, C.R. (1998).  A case for hope in pain, loss, and suffering.  J.H.Harvey, J. Omarzu, & E. Miller 

        (Eds.), Perspectives on loss: A Sourcebook (pp. 63-79). Washington, DC: Taylor and Francis.

Wright, B.A. (1983).  Physical disability: A psychosocial approach. New York: Harper and Row.

Gratitude for the Disability Manager

by: Jasen Walker, Ed.D., and Fred Heffner, Ed.D.

     CEC Associates, Inc., Valley Forge, PA 19482

“Man need only divert his attention from searching for the solution to external questions and      pose the one, true inner question of how he should lead his life, and all the external questions will be resolved in the best possible way.”   Leo Tolstoy

“Gratitude is the best attitude.”  Roberto Assagioli

Introduction

Disability Management, the proactive organizational system of preventing and reducing costly effects of workplace disability, is tough work.  Those employees assuming the role and responsibilities of Disability Manager (DM) are “middle managers” attempting to create and maintain coordination and collaboration among those organizational members with disparate and competing interests. The DM must somehow justify (usually to upper level financial officers) the time and expense of a company-wide human capital strategy (i.e., keeping people healthy, at work, and productive.)  At the same time, the DM must convince the employee population (sometimes unionized) that paying employees to stay home and collect workers’ compensation, short-term, and long-term benefits is in no one’s best interest.  Ken Mitchell, a pioneer in the disability management program movement, has referred to these dynamics as the “politics of disability” in the workplace. 

Empirical evidence has shown that the twin strategies of trying to prevent injuries in the first place and working to minimize their disabling effects through disability management interventions in the second place are highly effective.  In the summary of a critical and defining study, Successful Employer Strategies for Preventing and Managing Disability, Rochelle V. Habeck states:

“Employer policies and practices can reduce the incidence and improve the outcomes of work disability, especially when the policies and practices are a conscious and coordinated part of the company’s overall goal.”

However, the evidence that disability management works may not be enough to convince business leaders.  Ultimately, an organizational commitment to implement strategies for preventing and managing disability likely depends on an informed DM’s character strengths and leadership capabilities.

The DM must not only possess knowledge of risk management, medical/health programs, human resources, and industrial/labor relations but also manifest character strengths and virtues that convince organizational leaders to foster a company-wide commitment to proactively prevent and manage disability in the workplace.  The DM must be capable of convincing key members of the work organization that they can both “do the right thing” and profit enormously from doing so.  Too often in the world of business, in which profit rules, doing what is “right” is viewed as suspect if not contemptuous.  Along with being armed with evidence that companies can profit from preventing injuries and minimizing their disabling effects, the DM must possess the creativity, open-mindedness, persistence, courage, social intelligence, and leadership to sell, implement, and maintain human resource strategies that keep people healthy and happy while at work.

Positive psychology focuses on positive emotion and positive traits, particularly human strengths and virtues.  Positive psychology, however, also concerns itself with positive institutions, such as workplaces that are democratic, inclusive, and conducive to facilitating other positive experiences, including flow and gratitude.  Among the strengths that a DM must possess most is the capacity to experience and express gratitude.

Gratitude

Gratitude is a timeless concept that has fascinated philosophers, religious leaders, and authors of self-help literature but also a subject that has received little sustained attention from the scientific community.  Gratitude is derived from the Latin gratia, meaning grace, graciousness, or gratefulness.  According to Emmons and Shelton (2005), gratitude psychologically is felt as a sense of wonder, thankfulness, and appreciation for life.  Gratitude has been empirically linked with other positive emotions including contentment, happiness, pride, and hope.

In reviewing gratitude as concept in the history of ideas, Harpham (2004) references The  Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, the 18th century Scottish economist, considered by many as the father of modern economics.  According to Harpham, Smith recognized that it was “…not benevolence or love of our fellow human beings that brings food to our table,” but self-interest.  Smith apparently believed that self-interest was a more steady passion than benevolence because the unintended consequences of self-interest could be calculated and projected into the future.  Although Smith felt that self-interest played a central role in economic theory of commercial society, Harpham goes to length to explain that Smith also wrote The Theory of Moral Sentiments in which he recognized the importance of gratitude in the maintenance of a successful commercial society.  Harpham wrote: “According to Smith, gratitude is the passion or sentiment that prompts us to reward others for the good they have done us.”

Gratitude in modern life generally follows what Erickson (1963) termed identity, the primary developmental task of late adolescence and young adulthood.  Gratitude, according to Erickson, manifests itself through generativity, the adults concerned for a commitment to promoting the well-being of the next generation through parenting, teaching, mentoring, and leading.  As Tolstoy and Assagioli undoubtedly recognized, the development and expression of gratitude in the modern world generally challenges most of us.

Gratitude is offered here as a fundamental and essential attitude for DMs to nurture in themselves and others.  By cultivating gratitude in themselves, DMs will hopefully model a critical set of behaviors that they want to find in others who might ultimately support the proactive, humanistic strategies necessary to prevent and ameliorate the consequences of injury and/or illness that are antecedent to workplace disability. 

Shelton (2000) has portrayed gratitude as a key ingredient that makes up a daily moral inventory that individuals can use to foster moral growth.  Shelton posits that developing a healthy moral life involves, first of all, self-awareness that one is a moral being.  Second, by engaging in a daily moral inventory with a genuine intention to foster personal moral development, one is more likely to experience positive emotions associated with gratitude, such as humility and empathy.  Third, searching for reasons to be grateful in daily experiences that otherwise evoke nongrateful thoughts and feelings “stretches” the character beyond the egocentric habitual ways of interpreting day-to-day life from a “take it for granted” perspective.

Naikan, a form of personal moral development, was developed by Yoshimoto Ishin (1916-1988), a devout Buddhist of the Jodo Shinshu sect in Japan. Naikan reflection is based on three questions, queries one poses to oneself daily: 

·        What have I received from...?

·        What have I given to…? 

·        What troubles and difficulties have I caused...? 

Asked of oneself daily, Naikan questions can provide an opportunity to gain perspective, reevaluate one’s priorities, and experience gratitude, humility, and appreciation.

Emmons and Shelton (2005) inform us that Miller (1995) offers a simple, four-step behavioral-cognitive approach for learning gratitude: (a) identify nongrateful thoughts, (b) formulate gratitude-supporting thoughts, then (c) substitute the gratitude-supporting thoughts for the nongrateful thoughts, and (d) translate the inner feeling into outward action.

Rehabilitation professionals often develop a sense of thankfulness when they realize through working with their clients that they have a particular level of health and well-being.  Moreover, rehabilitation professionals are often humbled by the courage their clients demonstrate.  Finally, rehabilitation professionals are fortunate enough to experience the gratitude that clients can express when they feel they have truly been helped.

Most DMs have been professionally trained in rehabilitation as evidenced by the Certification for Disability Management Specialists (CDMS).  It seems that because most DMs have experience in the altruistic-nurturing rehabilitation profession, a career path frequently encountering situations that potentially foster giving and/or receiving expressions of gratitude, DMs will recognize the importance of maintaining an attitude of gratitude.  That attitude will likely be essential in helping an organization develop, implement, and maintain proactive strategies for DM. 

Why gratitude for the Disability Manager?

DMs often have experience in rehabilitation of people injured through trauma or disabling disease.  Through that experience, DMs have come to appreciate the value of good health and independence.  People experiencing trauma often pass through stages of recovery.  Initially, they are victims.  With time and support, they become survivors.  Ultimately, rehabilitation professionals want to facilitate an injured person’s recovery to the point that the survivor is once again a contributing citizen, most often through meaningful employment. 

Through their experiences with people who have experienced trauma and recovery, rehabilitation professionals acting as DMs maintain a sense of gratitude for both the gift of personal health and power of individual spirit.  Witnessing others overcome what is perceived as tragedy is uplifting.  Nothing can make us more grateful than knowing another human being who has broken through physical, psychological, and social barriers with resilience.  If only vicariously, DMs generally have had personal and professional experience with awesome human resilience, and for that, they are grateful.

DMs are familiar with our society’s history of discrimination against and exclusion of people with physical and/or mental impairments.  The language evolution of describing particular Americans as crippled, handicapped, disabled, or challenged has given the DM an appreciation for the struggles of individuals who have received minority status.  DMs can be grateful that they are responsible for bringing this evolution of both language and behavior to the workplace.

DMs are likewise aware of this country’s remarkable legislative efforts to include and mainstream its citizens with disabilities.  Although most would want more progress, to be grateful for the moral insight and courage of local and national leaders who have advocated for removal of barriers and greater inclusion can only ground the DM in a rich tradition of human rights.  DMs can be grateful that they are given the responsibility of extending this bold civil rights tradition from the public sector into the private, sometimes sacrosanct, structures of work organizations. 

Moreover, DMs are educators.  They are enhancing the new workplace in America, one that is realizing its gifts of diversity and employment of talent in whomever they may be found.  DMs can be grateful that they have the opportunity to expand the awareness and change the behaviors of their co-workers, much as civil rights advocates have changed the American public.

DMs are by tradition rehabilitation professionals.  Rehabilitation in America has not lived up to its potential primarily because it has functioned as a professional antechamber to society, a profession that has tended to provide services to others outside the mainstream.  DMs can now more expansively employ vocational assessment, job reengineering and accommodation, transition to work, and other paradigms that have been the fruit of the rehabilitation profession’s labor.  DMs can also help organizations integrate the various human resources that proactive companies attempt to make available to their employees.  Integration of existing human resources and human capital strategies is often the result of the DM’s awareness that any of us are only “temporarily able,” and without various forms of assistance, many of us might be less productive or even unemployed.

And perhaps the awareness that all of us are only temporarily able provides the DM with the basis for experiencing and hopefully expressing gratitude.  Among all of the organization’s “middle managers,” it is the DM who through professional training and experience can recognize that the benefit of well-designed and integrated disability management may someday be extended to him or her.  That is, through his or her training and professional experience, the DM is anchored by the realization that he or she could potentially require the type of assistance available in an organization’s Disability Management Program.

To experience gratitude, DMs need only to reflect on the potential of making workplaces more compatible with the diversity of the country in which we live.  The challenge is ours, and the opportunity deserving of thankfulness.

DMs can consider Tolstoy’s advice and answer their internal questions regarding the professional lives they lead and the external questions including to whom and for what we might be grateful are more easily answered.  For the DM, among all organizational managers, “Gratitude is the best attitude.”

References

Emmons, R. A. (2004). Thanks!  New York: Houghton Mifflin

Emmons, R. A., & McCullough, M. E. (Eds.). (2004). The Psychology of Gratitude.   New York: Oxford University Press.

Emmons, R. A., & Shelton, C. M. (2005). Gratitude and the Science of Positive Psychology. In Handbook of Positive Psychology (pp. 459-71). New York: Oxford University Press.

Habeck, R. V., Scully S. M., Vantol, B., & Hunt, H. A. (1998, December).  Successful Employer Strategies for Preventing and Managing Disability.  Rehabilitation Counseling Bulletin, 42(2), 144-61.

Disability Management Parallels Positive Psychology in Work Organizations

By:    Jasen Walker, Ed.D., and Fred Heffner, Ed.D.

         CEC Associates, Inc., Valley Forge, PA 19482

Background:

All work organizations encounter problems with lost time secondary to employee injury or illness.  To some degree, all companies operationalize disability management, which is broadly defined as the organizational prevention of and reaction to lost time associated with employee injury or illness.  Proactive Disability Management Programs (DMPs) have become viable and practical human resource management strategies that follow positive psychological principles.

DMPs became human capital strategies after a series of economic studies in the 1990s showed that disability costs in the workplace averaged 8% of company payrolls and that some organizations were spending as much as 31% of payroll on various consequences of employee disability.  Now, after two decades of development, DMPs target human factors in the workplace and are designed on psychological principles that govern human behavior.  For example, underlying assumptions of proactive disability management are that (1) work is a central theme in the lives of individual employees; (2) following the onset of injury or illness, employees want to continue working; and (3) if reasonably accommodated, they can and will return to work.  DMPs are thus human capital strategies following psychological laws of human behavior.  DMPs have economic consequences in work organizations.

People acquire disabilities through aging and a multitude of mishaps, diseases, and afflictions, and as with most human problems, disability has been historically viewed through the lens of a medical-disease model.  Since World War II, vocational rehabilitation has tended to follow a similar model, one that has paralleled the evolution of psychology, a science largely devoted to healing mental illness rather than enhancing and enriching life skills.  Since the days of Sigmund Freud, when the famed psychoanalyst asserted: “I found little that is good about human beings on the whole.  In my experience most of them are trash,” psychology and the human behavioral sciences in general have not looked seriously at the positive side of human beings, until recently.

Over the last decade, Positive Psychology has captured the attention of social scientists from around the world.  Empirical studies have shown that the “good life” can be found in thriving communities that focus on positive affect, good citizenship, responsibility, altruism, gratitude, moderation, tolerance, and the work ethic.  Positive psychologists have begun recognizing that “the best things in life” can be found in meaningful work.  Moreover, meaningful and “healthy” work can be experienced by workers with health impairments as well as employees without impairments in organizations that are committed to positive psychological principles.

The Science of Positive Psychology and Disability Management:

In 1998, Martin E. P. Seligman, Ph.D., the renowned University of Pennsylvania psychologist, urged the American Psychological Association (APA) to refocus its mission from exclusively defining and treating mental illness to also finding and advocating pathways to mental health and emotional well being.  The APA followed the lead of at least one other profession: Organizational Disability Management.  That is, since the mid-1980s, DMPs have evolved from simply allowing the injured worker to collect disability payments (at worst) or litigating the compensable injury claim until resolution (at best) to “light-duty” programs.  Now, DMPs implement “proactive” prevention and early intervention processes of refined job selection, employee health maintenance, injury prevention, and transition to meaningful work as quickly as possible following the onset of lost time.

The traditional, now antiquated, medical-disease model of workplace disability (in which only physicians made return-to-work decisions) was comparable to the mental illness/treatment approach applied in the pre-positive stage of psychology, during which psychiatrists and psychologists diagnosed and treated only people with mental illness.  Seligman was encouraging his colleagues to focus on character, virtue, optimism, and various other acts in life that prevent and reduce human strife.  Psychologists were discovering that among life’s virtues was meaningful work!

Disability managers had already realized that safety programs, wellness programs, employee assistance programs, leadership effectiveness, conflict resolution strategies, and good old common sense in the workplace reduced the number and severity of disability claims.  Research from the University of Michigan showed that enlightened employers applying “an integrated continuum of intervention” measurably reduced disability expenditures.  Prior to “positive psychology,” it had already become clear to disability management specialists and organizational leaders that most employees experience the “good life” in part through rewarding work and that injured employees respond better to return-to-work efforts if they perceive themselves as valued and respected members of the organization prior to any injurious incident or illness.  As a consequence, disability costs were reduced.

DMPs continue to recognize that if an injury or illness were to occur, the organization and not the physician alone can assist the impaired employee with a meaningful transition to work, one executed with purposeful dialogue, reasonable accommodation, and an “integrated continuum” of intervention.  What is more, DMPs in the context of viable human resource and human capital paradigms have begun to demonstrate that absence prevention and productivity maintenance are realized through effective employee well being and safety programs.  These realizations have led to the proactive (preventive) approach of disability management used in well-managed companies today.

Positive Psychology has begun transforming the world of psychological assessment and treatment by amending the disease model and establishing an empirical basis for what constitutes “the good life.”  State-of-the-art disability management has unearthed the understanding that “the good work life” is a function of sound hiring practices, worker safety, employee wellness, effective interpersonal communication, conflict resolution, broadbrush employee assistance, transformational leadership, and the application of positive human resources before and after worker injury or illness.  Like Positive Psychology, disability management no longer relies exclusively upon the medical paradigm of disease and sets forth a collaborative model of prevention, early intervention, job accommodation, and return to work.

Sound Hiring Practices:

Sound hiring practices are fundamentally important to disability prevention and management and may indeed be more important than safety programs.  In reality, only conscientious individuals concerned with the welfare of others (a personal characteristic that can be assessed through careful screening and selection) will become the team players essential to keeping themselves and others safe and well in the workplace.  Moreover, conscientious individuals are so whether or not they have a history of medical impairment.  The notion that a person with a disability is a higher risk for injury in the workplace has long been dismissed as myth.  Hiring individuals with disabilities who can be appropriately assigned (with accommodation if needed) is a sound human resource management policy.

The DuPont corporation has been surveying its workforce, dating back to at least 1973, in respect to the effectiveness of employees with disabilities as opposed to employees without.  The results have consistently shown that employees with disabilities rated average or better in job performance, and in some years even surpassed their non-disabled co-workers in job performance.

The significance of these and similar studies demonstrates that transition to work following occupational injury or illness makes good management sense.  Pennsylvania employers who do not have sound hiring and transition-to-work policies may be failing from the very beginning to establish proactive disability management.

The Importance of the “Essential Functions”:

The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) introduced a landmark concept to private sector employers: the “essential functions” of a job.  The ADA clarified what constitutes a job.  That is, the Job Description must specify the essential functions of that job, and only the essential functions of the job.  If a person can do the essential functions of a job, the employer cannot deny the job on the basis of an individual’s inability to do something outside of those functions.  In short, the ADA made the existence of a valid Job Description prima facie evidence in case of a legal dispute involving discrimination. 

That reality led to the need to do verifiable job analyses producing essential function job descriptions.  To pass muster, a Job Description is a list of the specific physical and mental activities of a job.  The specificity is achieved by observational and physical measurements of non-exertional and exertional activities.  Examples of activities include but are not limited to:

         ·    how many hours of standing in measured steps (hours) are required for the job,

         ·    what are the specific repetitions required of the job and how many repetitions per hour.

The Job Description (the outcome) is based solely on the results of the job analysis (the process).  The Job Description may no longer be a creative narrative, usually ending with something like, “And other duties as assigned by the supervisor.”

Another aspect of these disability management concerns is the ADA issue of “job accommodation.”  The ADA specifically states that if an individual can do what is required in the Job Description, “with or without accommodation,” then that person’s application for that job cannot be denied. 

Hiring the right person for a job is important to the employer, and hiring the right person must be based on a pre-existing Job Description that in turn is based on a pre-existing job analysis.  Returning to work those injured at work with the use of a pre-accident Job Description and job modification is sound human resource management.

It is important to note that the ADA, which was enacted in 1990, was recently amended by Congress.  The basis of the 2008 amendments is to strengthen the definition of disability in the original Act, thereby reinforcing the intent of Congress to support the rights of qualified individuals with disabilities to find meaningful employment in the workplace.

Worker Safety:

Planning for employee safety in the workplace is a major responsibility for every work organization.  Injured employees can be a significant cost factor, and prudent employers do everything they can to minimize injury and lost time.  There is no longer variance among business leaders regarding the value of Safety Programs.

If Safety Programs were 100 percent effective, people would not be injured at work and there would be no lost time secondary to occupational accidents.  In fact, Safety Programs are not 100 percent effective, but the data are clear that a safe workplace and a safety-conscious workforce are without doubt the most cost-effective disability prevention and management objectives an organization can pursue.

Organizations with effective safety committees are in the best position to smoothly integrate workers with disabilities if they are truly motivated to do so.  Success with workplace Safety Programs is generally the result of the organization infusing its culture with workplace safety practices and procedures.

Employee Wellness:

Employers have become aware that it is to their financial benefit to plan and conduct Wellness Programs.  As a corollary to a safety initiative, and as an integral component of a comprehensive disability management program, Wellness Programs are prevention methodologies that communicate commitment to a workforce.  Issues such as exercise, smoking cessation, obesity, regular physical checkups, drug use, and nutrition are more than feel-good concepts.  Paying attention to wellness issues carries significant paybacks for employers in terms of reducing absenteeism and limiting the costs of health benefit programs.

Effective Interpersonal Communication:

Lost time from work is too often precipitated by a buildup of tensions between supervisors and subordinates.  Interpersonal communication is the key ingredient in establishing cooperative relationships that are vital to workplace productivity.  Thomas Gordon began a national movement in leadership effectiveness by promoting the skills of active listening to help employees solve problems.  Gordon was fond of saying, “being the leader doesn’t make you one.”  He recognized that job productivity is most often realized when both the supervisor and the supervisees are getting their needs met.  Human beings in the workplace are big challenges for most of us.  Instructing front-line supervisors how to effectively communicate interpersonally and maintain good relationships with those they lead not only maximizes productivity, but it improves corporate cultures and prevents the workplace stressors and tension buildups that often lead to carelessness, accidents, and injuries.

Conflict Resolution:

In any workplace, conflicts between employees or between employees and their supervisors are inevitable.  Conflict is a part of life, but when it goes unmanaged and unresolved, it can be destructive.  Well-managed companies recognize that unresolved workplace conflicts can be very expensive.  According to Daniel Dana, Ph.D., a pioneer in a conflict resolution method known as Managerial Mediation, unmanaged conflict is the largest reducible cost in organizations today.  It is also the least recognized cost.

Organizational managers can readily take proactive measures to deal with conflict when its existence is recognized.  Since specific conflict resolution methods (and even training materials) are available, prudent management can easily adopt methods to teach these skills to their supervisors and managers.  Workers’ compensation claims can be, and frequently are, the result of unresolved conflict.

Employee Assistance Programs:

Employee Assistance Programs (EAPs) represent one of the oldest interventions that good management put into place to increase positive worker relations and productivity.  In brief, EAPs begin with the identification of a troubled worker and a planned attempt to assist the employee in ameliorating the personal problem because it affects the employee’s productivity.  Historically, if an employee had a substance abuse problem, for example, the EAP provided specialized counseling to intervene and assist the employee and his or her family in controlling the condition.  According to the U.S. Department of Labor, the vast majority of drug users are employed, and when they arrive for work, they don’t leave their problems at the door.  But, today’s EAPs are generally more and more “broad-brush,” providing assistance to workers with various psychosocial problems that may be manifesting themselves at work and interfering with workplace relationships and productivity.

Within companies employing a relatively large number of workers, the EAP may begin with an intervention from an in-house staff member, but as with all disability management concepts, front-line supervisors and co-workers are encouraged to assist in making appropriate referrals.  In smaller companies, the appropriate referral may be to an external resource.  Disability management is, in fact, most effective when it becomes part of the organizational culture.  To achieve this level of integration, all effective disability management programs are initiated through transformational leadership.

Transformational Leadership:

While the term transformational leadership may seem somewhat overdrawn, it can be defined in specific terms (concepts).  These concepts are what companies should expect of their top leaders.  Transformational leadership occurs when one or more persons engage with others in such a way that leaders and followers raise one another to higher levels of motivation, action, and morality, according to James MacGregor Burns, the noted presidential biographer who coined the term.   Companies that recognize the value of a proactive disability management program generally do so because their leaders are transformational.  That is, they are leaders who are able to recognize opportunities, inspire action, transform outcomes, and facilitate change in those around them. 

At minimum, “transformational” leadership includes the following.  The leader:

             ·    encourages initiative;

             ·    delegates responsibilities;

             ·    generates ideas and encourages others to generate ideas;

      ·    shares ideas;

             ·    takes calculated risks;

       ·    ensures that all employees have documented goals;

       ·    initiates mentoring and coaching programs; and

       ·    values, trusts, and respects all those who work for the company.

Peak leadership performance may very well be a prerequisite to more fully controlling the financial and human costs associated with workplace accident and injury.  However, more often than not, the initiation of a well-designed Disability Management Program is but another manifestation of transformational leadership as described above.

Positive Human Resources:

In companies that are large enough to have Human Resource (HR) programs, the basic methodologies of Disability Management already exist in positive human capital strategies.  These HR strategies (i.e., health and wellness programs, employee assistance programs, and effective recruitment and selection) may represent “silos” or independent programs rather than components of an integrated Prevention and Management System.  The synergy (e.g., the whole is greater than the sum of its parts) of these HR programs is a necessary step in creating proactive, integrated prevention and management of disability in the workplace.

A significant correction in professional psychological thought now offers organizations further evidence that proactive, multidimensional, and integrated positive human resource programs are the building blocks of an efficacious Disability Management System.  In the past, clinical psychology usually identified human dysfunction and considered ways of treating it.  Clinical psychology has spent too much time with late interventions and treatments and too little time preventing illness and promoting strategies for optimal experiences.  In 1998 the APA abruptly challenged this historical trend.  Through the transformational leadership of Seligman and others, the APA changed its course and focused on identifying the “positive” human virtues and characteristics that lead to the “good life,” including peak human performance, organizational productivity, job satisfaction, and thriving.  Positive Psychology focuses on both the theory and methodology of identifying, promoting, and teaching ways in which individuals, schools, workplaces, and communities can identify and experience the best in themselves through optimism, resilience, gratitude, team effort, and devotion.

Proactive disability management represents what is currently among the “best practices” in organizations because it serves to leave no one behind while it promotes organizational health and productivity.  Proactive disability management is a function of positive psychological constructs that reflect what is best about human beings when they elevate themselves by devoting time and energy to improve themselves and the lives of others around them.

Steps toward Transforming a Workers’ Compensation “Light Duty” Program into a State-of-the-Art Disability Management System

1.      Turn your safety committee into a Disability Prevention and Management Committee and include human resource, medical (Case Management), and legal personnel.

2.      Improve hiring practices by using essential function job descriptions and pre-employment testing related to essential job functions.

3.      Train line supervisors (leaders) how to communicate – interpersonally – more effectively.

4.      Teach managers how to mediate employee disputes and resolve work conflicts.

5.      Provide transition-to-work and job accommodation programs.

6.      Integrate EAP and Wellness Programs into the safety committee as it morphs into a Disability Prevention and Management program.

7.      Help leadership become “transformational” by providing information and selling leadership on the merits of Disability Prevention and Management.

8.  Be Positive and Optimistic.  Have fun and be devoted!