ABSTRACT
In this chapter, we turn to the specific programs and services that the HO provides, in order to better understand the effects that they may bring about among the employees. As reported earlier, Scania’s health policy is conceptualized into three programs: (a) red, i.e., rehabilitation and restoration of sickness and illness; (b) yellow, i.e., prevention of sickness and illness; and (c) green, i.e., promoting health. Some of the activities and programs that the HO devises can certainly be categorized as ‘red’ because they are offered only when there are some concrete and immediate health problems that require care; all these activities and programs are also contrived to function as instruments that can help to prevent general categories of health problems from reoccurring. Furthermore, all activities and programs that can be categorized as ‘yellow’ because they are offered as instruments for the prevention of health problems and risks are also meant as instruments for revealing concrete and immediate health problems. Hence, red and yellow activities and programs are interrelated in a circular movement, where the one tends to lead to the other. The ‘green’ activities and programs are somewhat idiosyncratic because their point of departure is different; green activities and programs are neither set off by some concrete and immediate health problems, nor by some screening for early signs of what may in the long run develop into such health problems, but by a belief in the potential of improving individuals’ general state of health, well-being and efficiency. The most concrete example of a red activity takes place when an
employee reports in sick and therefore is unable to come to work. The HO then provides a so-called health dialogue service. Traditionally, when employees are sick they have reported this to the person directly over them in the formal hierarchy. With the health dialogue service, the Scania employees instead report in sick to a nurse at the HO. The nurse documents not only the name of the employee, but also why he or she reports in sick. Furthermore, the nurse asks the employee a set of more specific questions about the symptoms of the illness and gives various advice as to how the employee should handle the illness. This process is repeated the third day of the employees’ absenteeism and again on the eighth day. Through this process the intention is, on the one hand, to provide the employee with an
immediate professional response that may help the employee in his or her self-care. On the other hand, it is to provide the HO with information about specific individuals’ illnesses, which can then be added to its general statistical knowledge about absenteeism. A nurse explained that
basically, the health dialogue is a way of keeping track of employees’ absenteeism, both on the individual and on the organizational level. This knowledge is useful in so many ways. It lets us know which of our individual employees have specific health problems such as shoulder, neck and back problems, stomach problems, sleeping disorders, etc. By providing this information to our statisticians we can also learn more about what groups of employees have these problems, where these groups work, how they live, how old they are, if they are primarily men or women, if they are slim or overweight, and so on.
