Osmond Ergonomics

This article was originally emailed as issue 169 of our monthly eBulletin at 11:30 on 13/12/2023. You can register here to receive them monthly.

ANOTHER ANNIVERSARY & A LOOK TO THE FUTURE

As we approach the end of the calendar year, we are delighted to celebrate 14 years of the eBulletin. During that time, we have delivered 168 monthly newsletters – and only a handful have been ‘not quite’ on time! An anniversary is a time to reflect and, with the arrival of readily-available AI tools, I have been pondering on the march of technology, especially in the last twelve months. The question I keep exploring is ‘How much online content is still written by humans?’. You can rest assured that ALL of ours is, but we are using ChatGPT and Google Bard as research tools for articles and experimenting with other AI tools like automatic meeting minutes. I have even been playing with a voice cloning app that creates audio of ‘my voice’ from typed text. Does that mean that future podcasts will also be created without humans? Or maybe they already are! That’s amazing and frightening in equal measure.

OXFORD EVENT – SAVE THE DATE – 05/03/24

We are planning a significant free event in Oxford on Tuesday March 5th, 2024. Save the date if you are a professional involved in facilities, estates, HR, wellbeing, equity, diversity or inclusion. The venue is the fabulous Linbury Building at Worcester College, in the heart of Oxford. Opposite the bus station and less than 10 minutes’ walk from the railway station, Linbury sits in 26 acres of gardens. The agenda will match the setting, with Rosie Russell and Dr Nigel Oseland already on the programme. Full details will follow early in the New Year.

SMART WORKING HANDBOOK

If you are formalising your hybrid/smart working programme, reviewing it, honing it or at a loss about what to do next, you need the Smart Working Handbook. First published in 2011, the new 3rd edition was released at the beginning of this month and I was delighted to attend the London launch by Andy Lake, its author. Full of practical, structured information and guidance, it includes case studies from organisations as diverse as GCHQ and Airbnb. Find out more and download your free copy here.

PODCAST UPDATE

I’m really pleased with feedback from the first episode of my new podcast. Monthly instalments are released at 6:30am on the first Monday of each month and December’s (number 2) is now available. Dan Williams of Visualise Training & Consultancy provided us with an entertaining and heart-felt discussion about disability, doing the right thing and whether labelling individuals is more of a hindrance than a help. Find out more and select your listening platform here.

YEAR END SHUTDOWN

As always, we shall be closed for the Christmas and New Year period. The last order date for confirmed 2023 delivery of stock items is Monday December 18th. We shall close at noon on Friday December 22nd, reopening at 09:00 on Tuesday January 2nd, 2024. Along with the whole team, I would like to thank you for your continued business and support through 2023. Watch out for exciting news early in 2024!

This article was originally emailed as issue 168 of our monthly eBulletin at 11:30 on 08/11/2023. You can register here to receive them monthly.

AS YET UNTITLED

My podcast has finally arrived and the first episode is now available on Spotify, Audible and Apple. You can select your platform here. New instalments will be available from 6:30am on the first Monday of each month and you can follow/subscribe to be notified as they drop. The overarching theme is inclusive wellbeing and we shall be inviting guests from a broad range of backgrounds to discuss physical, mental, emotional and design issues in the workplace. A key factor will be that we shall also broaden the conversation out beyond the workplace to explore the value of our knowledge and experience in the wider community. As the heading infers, we do not yet have a permanent title and we are seeking your suggestions, with an Amazon voucher if we use your idea. This page also provides details of how to submit your proposal(s).

3D PRINTED FURNITURE

I have been exploring this concept with growing interest recently. Initially, I was curious about opportunities for the new installation at our sister company MSA Manufacturing. However, with increasing knowledge, it is clear that there is plenty of scope to create brand new products from recycled waste. You may already know that the finished article starts out as a hopper full of pellets that are then heated, but you may not know that this raw material may be post-consumer or post-industrial waste – or even wood-based. Back in February, I mentioned 3D printing in the context of circular design and now I can see it has real potential. Email me if you would like to know more.

CHILDREN, SCREENS & ERGONOMICS

Last month, we were blogging about Supporting the Ageing Workforce so it is appropriate to follow that with a discussion about ergonomics for children, especially those in education. Although we are not commercially active in the education sector, as a father, grandfather and former school governor, I am agitated by the lack of awareness about children’s posture when using portable electronic devices. In the use of laptops, tablets, smartphones and hand-held gaming devices, all sorts of terrible postures are adopted. These are bad at any time in our life but especially bad for young bodies that are still growing and developing. Read more here.

WORKPLACE TRENDS

Regular readers will know how much I enjoy the WT conferences and the October event was better than ever. Apart from the obvious (and enormous) benefit of interacting with people face-to-face (and enjoying great catering), The Office as a Desired Destination provided a platform for a diverse array of latest thinking. This time, regular topic updates such as the circular economy and designing inviting offices were joined by fascinating insights into designing for neurodiversity and living with ADHD. I have already booked for the next Research Summit in April 2024!

MORE TRAINING CHOICES

Although DSE-related training is still our bread and butter business, the enquiries we receive and services we provide are now covering a broad spectrum of inclusive wellbeing topics. We are working towards a structured portfolio of assessment, awareness and support training which will be launched early in 2024. In the meantime, contact Stuart Entwistle, our Training Manager, about all Equality, Diversity & Inclusion topics. If we don’t already have an answer or a partner we can introduce, we will definitely be able to redirect you to an excellent provider.

This article was originally emailed as issue 167 of our monthly eBulletin at 11:30 on 11/10/2023. You can register here to receive them monthly.

POSTURE GUIDANCE

Our guide for DSE users has been through many iterations in its 25+ years of existence. When it first appeared, everyone was using CRT monitors and we were training people not to put their screen on top of their CPU cabinet. There were no flat screens, no sit-stand desks, no mini keyboards and people could still remember ‘portable’ computers that were mains powered and weighed 13kg. For our latest version, we have opted for a landscape format so that we can introduce dual monitor use for the first time. It contains advice for all three types of dual screen configuration (one dominant monitor, equal use monitors and laptop plus extension monitor). As always, it’s available completely free to download from the resources section of our website. If you want to licence the content for your own corporate branded version or some other application, contact the Customer Service team.

GUY OSMOND PODCAST

There has been a slight change of ‘wrapper’ for the new podcasts and the format will now be my own personal offering rather than under the Osmond Ergonomics brand. This will give me licence to explore a wider range of topics over time. We have now recorded our first two podcasts and the third will be completed during October. The first episode will be released at 6:30am on Monday November 6th, 2023 and, thereafter, monthly on the first Monday of the month. Follow or Link with me on LinkedIn to make sure you’re kept informed.

NAME THAT PODCAST

in view of the format change, we are extending the search for a podcast title and the £100 Amazon voucher is still on offer if we use your suggestion. Ideally, we are hoping that people will listen to some of the early episodes to get ideas for the name but you may just have a clever pun or pithy title that you want to send in now. Once our first episode drops, there will be space to register ideas on the podcast web page. In the meantime, just drop me an email.

AGEING WORKFORCE

With all the other issues facing employers at the moment, the needs of ageing personnel may have slipped down the agenda. However, as retirement ages rise and people work into their 70s, these matters cannot be overlooked. Our latest blog looks at some of the statistics relevant to this topic and then suggests an array of good practice activities to tackle ageism, including good workplace design practices for a multigenerational workforce.

AUTISM TRAINING

Following the success of our in-house Vision Awareness Training with Dan Williams of Visualise, our staff awareness topic for October was Autism. Passionate specialist, Dr Aishah Shadi, took us through two half-day interactive workshops and engaged the whole team in some animated discussion about the nature, misconceptions and realities of autism from both her clinical and personal experience. If you want to know more about team training or individual workplace needs assessments, please contact the Customer Service team.

This article was originally emailed as issue 166 of our monthly eBulletin at 11:30 on 13/09/2023. You can register here to receive them monthly.

THE NEW FRONTIER OF WORKPLACE ERGONOMICS

For neurodivergent workers, loud and brightly lit offices can cause sensory overload, anxiety and fatigue, so it’s essential to consider approaches such as providing adjustable workspaces, quiet zones and flexible working so they can perform at their best. Creating working environments where people can thrive, maximising productivity and preserving health and wellbeing, is the purpose of ergonomics and human factors. However, for decades the focus has been on physical comfort and safety, and more latterly mental wellbeing too. [Read the rest of this article in Safety Management magazine.

ACCESS TO WORK

We are hearing a lot about the DWP Access to Work scheme at the moment and most of what we are hearing is about processing times and waiting lists for assessment. We have worked in and around the scheme for over 30 years and we don’t believe anyone with a disability should have to wait weeks (or months) to address their needs. If you or a colleague want an assessment within days and a report soon after, with recommended actions and a single point of contact, talk to us about an alternative solution. Just schedule a 15 minute virtual meeting to find out more.

WEBINARS & PODCASTS SURVEY

Many thanks to all the legitimate participants in the survey we announced last month. It’s fair to say that the survey was a learning experience, but not in the way I hoped! It seems that announcing an ‘Amazon Gift Voucher’ offer will guarantee a deluge of responses from fake gmail addresses with non-existent phone numbers and, inevitably, unusable responses. It took a little while with some clever tools to remove the 2,000+ fakes but we managed to do so and the winner was Margaret Hanson of WorksOut.

PODCASTS COMING!

From the genuine survey data we did receive, we are sure we need to do podcasts. Expect a monthly session of about 45 minutes. There will be three regulars – a moderator, myself and an established physio/ ergonomist/ researcher (i.e. someone with proper qualifications!) – and a monthly guest. The topic will be selected by the guest under a broad heading of inclusive wellbeing. The one thing that’s missing is a podcast title. If you have any ideas, please email them to us. If we use yours, there will be an unnamed prize that will be identical to something referred to in a paragraph above!

3D PRINTED FURNITURE

3D printing may prove to be a key contributor to circular furniture design and manufacture. You may recall that I referred to this back in February after my visit to the Stockholm Furniture Fair. In addition to the strong evidence of progress in Scandinavia, the Netherlands is also emerging as a leader in this field. This is probably driven, at least in part, by the Dutch government’s requirement for circular design and manufacture in all public sector furniture procurement. Here is an example of a workplace sofa with a 3D-printed frame and 95% recycled materials

This article was originally emailed as issue 165 of our monthly eBulletin at 11:30 on 09/08/2023. You can register here to receive them monthly.

ARE EMPLOYERS GIVING UP ON HYBRID WORKING?

Google has just offered employees ‘a special deal’ at their campus hotel to ‘make it easier for Googlers to transition to the hybrid workplace’, President Biden is urging federal workers to return to the office and the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics has just reported that homeworkers work, on average, 2.5 hours less per day than office workers. In the USA, at least, it seems that the productivity claims for homeworking are now being challenged.

Of course, this could just be a case of what’s making the headlines this month and the reverse will be highlighted in the next few weeks! In the UK, it’s not long since we were laughing at Jacob Rees-Mogg and his ‘sorry I missed you’ notes to civil servants when many of us knew that government departments had been running very successful smart working programmes since long before Covid. Equally, does it really matter how many hours you work if you get all your work done? Maybe homeworkers work less hours because they just get through things more efficiently.

In the UK, it seems that many SMEs have returned to the office fully, but the view of larger European employers is still strongly supportive of the hybrid working model, even if they are still working at getting it right! There is no doubt in my mind that all-in or all-out is not the ideal solution for the vast majority of organisations and a balance can be found. It just needs care – and probably time. Neil Usher’s recent article provides a good insight into key considerations in workplace design.

THE DEEP WORK HYPOTHESIS

Do you remember when the only distractions from the work we were doing were phone calls or a colleague stopping by our desk? Now we are constantly bombarded by digital communications – like this one! We have been doing further research into the lead topic from last month’s eBulletin and thinking about ways to address the issue. Set aside some time to read our latest blog which explores the background and possible solutions, as well as providing access to Cal Newport’s book – Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World.

WEBINARS & PODCASTS

Our regular monthly webinars continue. The latest upcoming topics can always be found on this page and you can find previous webinar recordings here. We are also continuing our internal discussions about the future of these two communication styles and exploring formats for possible podcasts in the future. In the meantime, our Webinars & Podcasts survey is still open (for a few more days) so please take a couple of minutes to give us your views on the two formats and you could win a £100 Amazon gift voucher.

ISO 9001/14001 AUDIT

It’s an irony that our previous quality auditor gave us poor and inconsistent service! However, that’s now history and we are very pleased to have moved to NQA. Our first audit with the new assessor took place at the end of July and I am delighted to confirm that feedback was all positive. Our commitment to these standards is central to how we operate and they provide a structure for continuous improvement processes.

This article was originally emailed as issue 164 of our monthly eBulletin at 9:30 on 19/07/2023. You can register here to receive them monthly.

THE DEEP WORK HYPOTHESIS

Are the low-friction communications tools, like email, Teams and Slack, actually reducing our productivity? How often do you get to the end of a workday and think ‘All I’ve really done today is answer emails’? Author and computer science professor, Calvin Newport, argues that our almost-constant interaction with these tools distracts us so much from concentrated, deep thought that we may actually be losing the ability to think deeply at all. Newport says that, to learn hard things quickly, we need to focus intensely without distraction but that’s a skill that seems to be on the decline. Find out more from this podcast or join our discussion on LinkedIn.

PODCAST & WEBINAR SURVEY

We are reviewing our communications and considering the introduction of a monthly podcast. Recently, the growth of industry and commercial podcasts has been conspicuous and the abundance of these, alongside webinars, ensures a constant stream of online information, entertainment and education. Somewhat late to the party, I have become a podcast enthusiast myself since the start of the year and I am curious about your preferences. Please take a few minutes to give us your views in this short survey before 11.08.23. We shall be presenting a £100 Amazon voucher to one lucky participant..

THE VALUE OF AN OVERHEARD CONVERSATION

In the meantime, our webinar programme continues from a slightly different angle this month. Whilst we recognise the overall hybrid working trend since the Covid pandemic, the conversation about the pros and cons of office and homeworking continues to be complex, with widely dispersed individual experiences. This month, we have taken one element of the debate to highlight. It is based on my presentation at Clerkenwell Design Week and I look forward to exploring it further. Information and registration can be found here.

GOOD WORK DESIGN

The CIEHF (Chartered Institute of Ergonomics & Human Factors) has just launched a new infographic about Good Work Design. It lays out a three-phase, human-centric approach to the design of work for people to both enjoy and thrive. It is available as either a single, scrollable document for onscreen use or, if you want to print it, a 2-page A4 pdf. You can find both on this page. There was also a webinar about it earlier this month, the recording of which can be found on this page.

ELECTRIC CARS

As with all our business activities, our company vehicle policy is to reduce our carbon impact at every opportunity and, in particular, with each replacement. This is not the place to debate the environmental value of electric cars vs. petrol / diesel / hydrogen / etc. but my personal move away from Tesla driving has made me acutely aware of the fractured nature of UK charging infrastructure for other marques. In just three months’ ownership, I have accumulated 14 apps to accommodate the various charging companies I have encountered! If you’re an EV driver, what is your experience? I would love to hear.