Workplace Inclusion Programmes Destined To Fail Due To Lack Of Planning According To MedTech Founder
By Julius Ewudo, Cyber Era NG ASEAN Region Represntative
A leading Australian MedTech startup founder believes that inclusion programmes in male dominated industries including construction and manufacturing are being set-up for failure.
Founder of ‘PHYSIO first’ tech platform Health Stack James Fletcher is finding that inclusion programmes targeting workers from non-traditional backgrounds are not accounting for the common physical demands found in these roles in their onboarding process.
This lack of planning or understanding of how pain can turn up onsite, is seeing many workforce diversification programmes fall over, with major impacts on productivity and workforce availability.
For James Fletcher, this lack of tailoring, support and preparation around people’s individual capabilities to complete certain tasks is proving to be a major hurdle in diversification programmes in traditionally male dominated industries.
“I am seeing first-hand that despite the best intentions of employers and government agencies to encourage greater diversification, these initiatives are falling short,” said Mr Fletcher.
“Organisations are signing up for these initiatives and then failing to account for how differences in age, gender and demographics may impact the allocation and completion of manual tasks. I am regularly seeing how this is causing greater instances of injury, loss of productivity and negatively impacting workforce culture.”
Founded in 2020 during COVID by leading physiotherapist James Fletcher to facilitate digital care when in-person visits were limited, Health Stack utilises a hybrid, ‘PHYSIO first’ model combining tailored technology solutions and qualified health professionals to deliver its clinician-led digital health programmes.
Since its founding, it has rapidly built its reputation working with some of the largest companies in Australia, through its holistic approach to reducing workplace injury and ill-health for the manufacturing, construction, hospitality, transport, and logistics sectors.
According to James Fletcher it is this experience in delivering tailored preventative rather than reactive health programs for some of the country’s leading employers that is driving him to call for change.
“Our current model calls for inclusion without preparation, planning or preventative measures that acknowledge physical variation of people – I’ve seen firsthand how this drove a rise in workers compensation claims for one of our clients,” Mr Fletcher said.
“Rather than simply call for inclusion we need to assess how people can effectively perform in certain workplaces and design some tasks to tailor for these differences. Importantly this needs to identify how certain physical tasks can be broken down to allow for their completion, to avoid both injury and rising costs – it is this approach more than anything that will ensure sustainable change.”
