Dying at work. Work-related suicide – how does the UK regulatory context measure up?

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine how work-related suicides are monitored, investigated and regulated in the UK, examining a small selection of cases and drawing on international comparison with other countries. Effective data collection and regulation are the cornerstone of suicide prevention, and this paper aims to consider whether the UK’s current regulatory framework provides an effective basis for preventing work-related suicides. Design/methodology/approach This study draws on qualitative sociological methods and is based on an in-depth analysis of 12 suicide cases occurring between 2015 and 2020. In each case, work-related causal factors had been previously identified by at least one official source (police enquiry, coroner or employer’s investigation). This study analysed multiple sources of documentation and undertook interviews with individuals close to each suicide case. The aim of this study was to consider the organisational response of three stakeholder organisations to the suicides: the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), the coroner and the employer. Findings The study points to serious shortcomings in the UK’s regulatory response to work-related suicides. Suicides are currently not recorded, investigated or regulated. Whereas the fracture of an arm or leg in the workplace needs to be reported to the HSE for further investigation, a suicide occurring in the workplace or that is work-related does not need to be reported to any public agency. Employers are not required to investigate an employee suicide or make any changes to workplace policies and practices in the aftermath of a suicide. The work-related factors that may have caused one suicide may, therefore, continue to pose health and safety risks to other employees. Originality/value Whereas some recent studies have examined work-related suicides within specific occupations in the UK, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to analyse the UK’s regulatory framework for work-related suicides. The study on which the paper is based produced a set of recommendations that were targeted at key stakeholder organisations.

Beyond High-Stakes Assessment

High-stakes assessments in higher education serve a gate-keeping function for institutional and programmatic accreditation and determine outcomes for students on state boards and professional licensing and certification examinations. The assessments are defined by specific characteristics such as: a single, summative examination, a clear measure of success and failure, and significant consequences for candidates. Controversial aspects are related to whether they actually measure individual achievement or meaningful skills, the current mismatch between education and workplace needs, and the increased use of technology in instruction. Can high-stakes testing evolve and move with the times?

Teaching English Language Courses for Tourism and Hospitality Purposes (A Study of Graduates Workplace Needs)

When taking into account Palestinian tourism sites, mastering language English for instance is a prerequisite for serving and offering tourism services in tourist places such as Bethlehem, Jerusalem, Jericho and Hebron after graduation. In Palestine, English for Specific Purposes especially in hospitality and tourism purposes has not been given much investigation in research. Globally, English language is used as a medium of communication in contexts such as hospitality, travel, and tourism. This study examined how English language is used to prepare tourism and hospitability learners who anticipate serving in Palestinian tourism sites. The data indicated that the learners’ perceptions of the courses offered in English are not consistent with their aspirations and perceived academic English language needs, and their response to how they perceive the importance of English language needs was moderate. Based on these findings, the study suggests restructuring these courses and reconsidering the adopted teaching methods to help learners receive proper instruction geared towards intended learning outcomes and meets their future workplace needs. For future studies, it is recommended that quantitative and qualitative researches are needed to be carried out to analyze the actual needs of undergraduate students to the English language in programs hotel management and tourism.

The Employee's Right to Freedom of Religion versus the Employer's Workplace Needs: An Ongoing Battle: TDF Network Africa (Pty) Ltd v Faris 2019 40 ILJ 326 (LAC)

The right to religion is well protected in the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, 1996 (the Constitution) as well as attendant legislation. Section 15(1) of the Constitution provides that all persons have the right to freedom of religion. Section 31(1) of the Constitution then goes on to state that persons who belong to a religious community, amongst others, may not be denied the right to practise their religion with other members of that community. Section 9(3) of the Constitution prohibits the state from unfairly discriminating against any person directly or indirectly on several grounds, which include the ground of religion. Section 9(4) of the Constitution on the other hand prohibits any person from unfairly discriminating against any other person on the ground of religion, amongst others. These constitutional protections resonate in both the Labour Relations Act 66 of 1995 and the Employment Equity Act 55 of 1998. Despite these protections, the right to freedom of religion is still a contested subject in the workplace, inter alia. The contestation intensifies when the right to freedom of religion results in an employee not being able to comply with one or more of the employer's workplace needs. Employers' who do not understand the balance that has to be struck between the employee's right to freedom of religion and its workplace needs will often find themselves on the wrong side of our labour laws if they dismiss an employee without having due regard to the employee's religion. This is what transpired in TDF Network Africa (Pty) Ltd v Faris 2019 40 ILJ 326 (LAC).

From training to learning: Transition of a Workplace for Industry 4.0

BACKGROUND: Transition into Industry 4.0 has had many significant impacts. Customization symbolizes leanness, flexibility, adaptability, and agility. A business operator needs to recognize the factors that contribute to better utilization of the talents of its workforce and more effective workplace learning. OBJECTIVE: The study aims to provide a construct which highlights effective workplace learning. In this context, a construct represents a broad view of various interrelated ideas and concepts which can point to academic and practical implications. METHODS: The study applies action research which is suitable when observing a transformative change. The study intends to observe and notice how the environmental factors have changed and try to predict their impacts on human capital development. To help verify the suitability of these impacts, a comparison with similar studies or findings is made. Focuses on literature reviews which look at the impacts from Industry 4.0 (on a need to tackle the waste of the talents in a workplace), recent developments of learning (on an emerging importance of informal learning), and survey’s data (on a shift in a workplace’s expectation on the workers). RESULTS: Workplace learning has gradually replaced training and education. The proposed construct can help tackle the underutilization of the talents in a workplace as the workers are nowadays expected to perform the tasks and learn at the same time. CONCLUSIONS: Sustaining learning in a workplace needs to understand behavior, motivation, emotion, and workplace engagement. Informal learning, which reflects the individualization of learning, can enable an organization to deal with workplace learning.

Sustainable Housing Design: System Control Strategy

Current housing design faces various environmental, social, and economic issues, such as climate change, aging population, and workplace needs. Dealing with such issues and pursuing sustainability is a target-oriented challenge. The science of system control can be utilized for all target-oriented tasks. Therefore, applying system control, we have been developing methods for sustainable design. Based on our finished research and practice results, this chapter shows how to design sustainable homes. Section 2 briefly illustrates the methods with two figures: (1) the control system for promoting sustainable housing design, (2) the process of producing and revising sustainable housing design guidelines. Section 3 demonstrates a concrete process of creating sustainable design guidelines. First, it identifies global and general problems related to current homes and specifies requirements for sustainable housing design. Next, it converts these requirements into a tabular form of “housing elements, variables, and their desired values.” The completed table has turned out compact “sustainable housing design guidelines” for general use. The methods have four significant features: (1) total visualization for promoting sustainable design, (2) user-friendliness, (3) comprehensiveness, (4) flexibility toward optimization.

The COVID-19 Clinician Cohort (CoCCo) Study: Empirically Grounded Recommendations for Forward-Facing Psychological Care of Frontline Doctors

This study aimed to develop empirically grounded recommendations and a coherent model of psychological care derived from the experiences and psychological care needs of COVID-19 frontline doctors, using semi-structured interviews and thematic analysis. Participants were UK frontline doctors specialising in Emergency Medicine, Anaesthetics, or Intensive Care (n = 31) purposively sampled for maximum variation on gender, specialty, ethnicity, and trauma-related distress; most worked in ICU during the pandemic (71%). Four themes were derived: (1) ‘coping strategies’, participants used many, including exercise, mindfulness, and “wait until it gets really bad”; (2) ‘sources of support’, participants valued embedded psychological support, digital services, and informal conversations with colleagues or family, though there was little opportunity; (3) ‘organisational influences on wellbeing’, participants reported a love–hate relationship for concepts like ‘wellbeing’, seen as important but insulting when basic workplace needs were unmet; (4) ‘improving engagement with support’, analysis suggests we must reduce physical and psychological barriers to access and encourage leaders to model psychologically supportive behaviours. Doctors’ frontline COVID-19 working experiences shine a ‘spotlight’ on pre-existing problems such as lack of physical resources and access to psychological care. Empirically grounded recommendations and a model of incremental psychological care are presented for use in clinical services.

Predictors of Mental Health Outcomes in Grocery Store Workers amid the COVID-19 Pandemic and Implications for Workplace Safety and Moral Injury

Limited research exists on the mental health (MH) of grocery store workers (GSWs), who have been on the frontlines throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. A disaster MH conceptual model incorporating demographics, disaster exposure and threat (COVID-19 fear and workplace threat perception), perceived stress, and social support (lack of from family and friends) was utilized to predict MH outcomes (anxiety, depression, and post-traumatic stress symptoms; PTSS) of GSWs. GSWs (n = 842) were recruited through a regional union in California. The participants were diverse (62.1% female) and were 18–69 years of age (M = 41.5, SD = 13.9). They completed an online survey regarding COVID-19 fear, workplace threat perception, perceived stress, lack of social support, and workplace needs/recommendations for support. Three hierarchical linear regression models were run assessing each MH outcome. Thematic analysis coding and an inductive approach were utilized for analyzing open-ended responses of workplace needs/recommendations. Females and younger GSWs (ages 18–29 years old) on average, reported higher MH symptoms than males and older age groups, respectively. COVID-19 fear and perceived stress were significant predictors of anxiety, while COVID-19 fear, workplace threat perception, and perceived stress significantly predicted depression and PTSS, explaining almost half of the variance for each model. Social support and demographics were not predictive of MH outcomes. Almost half of GSWs (40%) requested increased safety protections in the workplace. Feelings of fear of COVID-19, threat in the workplace, and overall perceived stress are predictive of GSWs’ MH outcomes. Increasing feelings of safety in the workplace and reducing stress may lessen MH symptoms.

A study of employee well-being in the Kingdom of Bahrain

Organisations are investing in employee well-being initiatives, as employees constitute the most important stakeholder group. Employee well-being requires a focused and concentrated approach. The main aim of this study was to assess the importance of employee well-being in organisations in the Kingdom of Bahrain. The study was based on the five domains of employee well-being model [1]. The five domains being the health domain, the work domain, the values/principles domain, the collective/social domain, and the personal growth domain. The study revealed that majority of the participating organisations were focusing more on factors related to physical health and physical safety of their employees than on mental health. Significant factors like pay and rewards, autonomy, job satisfaction, people management policies, professional management, workload distribution, and leadership need improvement when compared to factors like work-life balance, open and inclusive work environment. All these factors relate to the work domain. In the values/principles domain, more participating organisations had a clear mission and objectives, and were investing in training their managers and employees, whereas ethical standards, diversity and inclusion, cultural engagement, corporate governance, corporate social responsibility, dignity at work and mutual trust at the workplace, needs to be given more attention. Very few participating organisations have value-based leadership and a well-being strategy in place. Teamworking, dignity and respect at the workplace were evident in more participating organisations than factors like positive and healthy relationships, employee voice, supportive management style. All these factors contribute to the collective/social domain of employee well-being, In the personal growth domain, performance management and personal development plans, open and collaborative culture, and succession planning were prevalent in more participating organisations than effective utilisation of employees’ skills, coaching and mentoring, resilience training, positive emotional relationships, financial well-being, challenging work , lifelong learning, access to training and creativity. Mid-career review was conspicuous by its absence in all participating organisations. The study reveals that employee well-being in organisations in the Kingdom of Bahrain needs more attention and focus than what is being accorded now.

Workplace Spirituality and Employee Job Attitude: Direct Test Effect: An Empirical Check Among Nursing Community

Workplace spirituality is a concept that is gaining traction in the business world. Finding opportunities for self-expression, practicing moral ideals at work, and experiencing sacredness in all aspects of life is what workplace spirituality entails. Nursing is a physically and emotionally taxing career when compared to other occupations, especially given the large amount of physical and emotional labour needed in patient care. The goal of this paper was to synthesise the relationship between workplace spirituality and one of three forms of employee job attitude. The study finding shows that there is a high relationship between spirituality in the workplace and employee job attitude. An integrated environment is necessary for any successful job. This study seems to be of value to researchers and practitioners. Spirituality in the workplace needs to be strengthened by an establishment's HR ethic, which in effect helps to build a positive work atmosphere for the future.