FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Release No. SPR-08-603-01
CONTACT: Carol Tobin, AIHA Meetings and Education
(703) 846-0745; ctobin@aiha.org
Melissa Hurley, AIHA Communications
(612) 743-7948, mhurley@aiha.org
AIHA Strategy Provides Key to Demonstrating Business Value of Industrial Hygiene
Research Identifies and Quantifies Links Between IH Investment and Business Value
MINNEAPOLIS, MN (June 3, 2008) — Eliminating lead from a hazardous waste stream. Substituting a less toxic material for a chromate primer at an aircraft company. Installing engineering controls at a small company to control exposure to nanoparticles. Besides the fact that these are all significant examples of the critical roles industrial hygiene plays within an organization, these developments also saved companies millions of dollars and, in some cases, enabled organizations to increase revenue. So why does most executive management not tie industrial hygiene with financial positives?
The Tuesday, June 3, American Industrial Hygiene Conference and Exposition (AIHce) general session discussed this and introduced “The IH Value Proposition.” Thomas G. Grumbles, CIH, past AIHA president and manager of product safety and occupational health for Sasol North America Inc. commenced the general session stating, “As industrial hygienists, we have an inherent sense of the value we provide.” He continued by saying that, “We know that our technical expertise and dedication brings value to the enterprises for which we work, but our impact on the working individuals under our watch ... our benefit to the businesses we work for ... and even the precise effects of the hazards we work to control ... isn't easy to measure. The value is not always easy to demonstrate.”
Communicating the business value that any investment contributes is not an easy task, yet increasingly, employees must demonstrate the specific financial benefits of a project to get the program greenlighted. Industrial hygienists must tap their business side, reach into the world of “corporate speak,” and make the case to executive management that critical industrial hygiene (IH) programs are not only necessary, they are sound investments. To help the community do this, the American Industrial Hygiene Association (AIHA) embarked on a multiyear project to study specifically which mechanisms allow industrial hygienists to demonstrate business impact at their organizations and to create a strategy that enables them to do it efficiently and effectively.
Working with EG&G Technical Services, a division of URS, and its partner ORC Worldwide, AIHA began an intensive process to create a strategy to help those in the field identify ways in which hygiene contributes to the success of a company. What resulted was a six-phase intensive study that analyzed the qualitative and quantitative impacts of IH.
Michael T. Brandt, DrPH, CIH, PMP, technical chief of staff for operations at Los Alamos National Laboratory and AIHA’s vice president-elect, took the session attendees further into the study. He talked about how at one company’s location, aggressive enforcement of purchasing standards to eliminate lead in paint at a foundry protected worker health and helped the site avoid significant costs associated with lead handling, medical surveillance, and personal protective equipment.
“The redesign of the production process at a plant manufacturing components of hybrid car batteries eliminated seven manual handling operations and got rid of titanium tetrachloride as a catalyst,” Brandt said. “Simultaneously it enabled a fivefold increase in product produced in the same building space. This kind of value – contributed by industrial hygienists – is something that any business person can understand.”
Dave Eherts, vice president, environmental health and safety for Sikorsky Helicopters, followed Brandt. Eherts added that industrial hygienists and environmental health and safety professionals have to understand the value that they bring to an organization if they are to be truly successful. “If you work for a CEO who gets it, then you should understand value so you can maximize it and prioritize initiatives that bring the highest value,” Eherts said. “And if your back is against the wall, you should understand the value of your profession to defend yourself from budget cuts and get the resources you need, and that you deserve.”
Joining Grumbles, Brant, and Eherts was Jeffrey Pino, president, Sikorsky Aircraft Corporation. Pino gave an informative and thought-provoking discussion about the value industrial hygienists add to an organization’s bottom line and the important role IH professionals have in communicating this value throughout the organization.
Pino reiterated to the crowd by giving a CEO’s perspective, “There are two things that must happen every day. First, every Sikorsky aircraft ever manufactured must land at the time and place of choosing of the pilot. Second, every employee must go home exactly as they came in, or better. We’re much better at the first than the second. We must be perfect in both cases.”
Three IH value proposition case studies were also presented in a lively multimedia format. In this first-time ever presentation, attendees heard about specific ways in which they can communicate with their organizations – up and down the management chain – the value of IH programs not only for worker health and safety but also for positive bottom-line impact. Conference-goers walked away from this session with information that will help them become catalysts for promoting the value of IH programs and change within their companies or organizations.
Grumbles described the study as “a new way of thinking about the value of your work.” He encouraged attendees to “think outside the box of traditional cost and benefit formulas, of demonstrating less of a potentially bad result and move to identifying more of the positive benefits of what we do.”
Several breakout sessions are scheduled throughout the week where individuals can learn more about the framework, tools, methodology, and conclusions of the value of the profession study. The American Industrial Hygiene Association (AIHA) and ACGIH cosponsor AIHce.
Detailed conference information and registration is available at www.aihce2008.org. For more information, contact AIHA at (703) 849-8888.
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Founded in 1939, the American Industrial Hygiene Association (AIHA) is the premier association of occupational and environmental health and safety professionals. AIHA’s 10,600 members play a crucial role on the front line of worker health and safety every day. Members represent a cross-section of industry, private business, labor, government, and academia. For more information, go to www.aiha.org.