Tuesday April 30, 2024
The Barwon Health Healthy Communities Unit is partnering with local health collaboration Active Geelong to support workplaces to increase physical activity and reduce sedentary behaviour of staff.
Using a Group Model Building approach, the team facilitated a staff consultation at Cobram Estate Olives to inform the development a new health and wellbeing program for workers at their Lara site.
Over two sessions with 12 workers, the team sought to understand the factors that influenced how active they were in a work day. Participants working in a range of roles including nursery, e-commerce, warehousing, production, refinery, laboratory and administration were involved in two workshops.
Together, they created a visual map of the factors influencing how active staff were in a work day.
Four key themes were identified: Work role and work load (job related factors), facilities available on site and in local community, and individual variables such as employment hours, mental wellbeing, motivation and family commitments.
This approach enabled the group of workers to establish a common understanding of the factors influencing how active they are on a work day, and how this varied between them depending upon job demands and individual circumstances.
The consultation engaged workers to design solutions to address barriers to being active, creating a list of prioritised actions for the workplace to consider in their health and wellbeing plan.
100% of participants agreed the topic of the consultation was relevant, and 73% reported an interest in being involved in developing future wellbeing initiatives at Cobram Estate Olives.
The process created a heightened awareness among staff about how active they are at work and new and creative ways to increase their activity levels. From simple solutions such as having music and movement breaks, to more complex facility upgrades, Cobram Estate is supporting workers to keep active and healthy at work.