Glasgow Prestwick Airport
When you’re running one of Scotland’s busiest airports, with flights to deal with 24 hours a day, the health of employees is vital to your success. Like any business, one of the biggest challenges for Glasgow Prestwick Airport has been finding ways to keep staff absence rates down.
Managers at Prestwick have found that signing up for the Healthy Working Lives Award Programme has helped them to more than halve absence rates. In the past two years, it has dropped from 5.5% to just 2.6%.
Human Resources Manager Sonia Rafferty believes the work carried out towards the Healthy Working Lives Bronze Award, which Prestwick achieved last year, has played a huge part in reducing sickness among the 500 staff who keep the airport going. “I definitely feel the Programme has helped,” she says. “Absence has dramatically decreased.”
The airport had already signed up for the Scotland’s Health at Work (SHAW) scheme when the new Healthy Working Lives Award Programme was launched in early 2007. However, Sonia says it was very easy to transfer across to the new programme.
“We started the SHAW scheme, and during that process it moved to Healthy Working Lives,” she says. “The criteria conveyed a much wider range of topics, including an emphasis on health and safety, this was something we already took very seriously – safety of our staff and passengers are paramount.”
With the core group of staff already set up to look after Occupational Health and Safety, Sonia adds that it was a natural progression for them to extend their role to include health and well-being.
“The Occupational Health and Safety committee members were pleased to be involved, and began focusing more on the health and well-being of our staff.
“We sent out a health needs analysis survey to all staff asking for feedback on the areas they wanted us to focus on. The airport then analysed the results and took on board their views.”
The survey results showed that staff were keen for the airport to help them to lead healthier lives by becoming fitter, so a Fit for Life @ Work Programme was set up, which included a health promotion suite and staff taking part in a variety of activities, including pilates and jogging classes. There are cycle routes around the airport, and in addition to providing bike parks, Sonia says they are looking into the possibility of a cycle to work programme, and offering gym facilities.
Free drinking water is provided, free fruit is delivered once a month and healthy recipes are circulated to help staff to have a more balanced diet at home as well as in the workplace.
When so many employees are working shifts, sometimes through the night to cover freighter flights, or starting as early as 4 am to prepare the airport for the first passengers to arrive, staff well-being is particularly important.
Sonia adds that the health promotion suite also helps to raise awareness of health topics, and staff – with a high proportion being male – can leave an anonymous note requesting information to be displayed about health topics they are interested in.
“It has been statistically reported that people don’t always want to approach their GPs, so there is the facility for staff to ask for information,” explains Sonia. “Over the last year we have put in place men’s health checks. We have brought in an external company to look at this area. It is recognised that men may find it more difficult to approach their GP’s regarding any concerns they have, and this will raise awareness.”
Sonia adds that the airport is already looking to build on its Healthy Working Lives Bronze Award by working towards the Silver Award, with an emphasis on promoting and supporting mental ill health and well-being. A new mental health policy has already been signed off and will be distributed to staff soon.
So far, Sonia says that staff at the airport have been very positive about the efforts to provide more support for healthier working lives. “It has been very well-received,” she says. “I personally feel it’s been successful because the employees have been involved.”
