ABSTRACT
Scania’s health promoting activities are offered through the Health and Work Environment unit. For the sake of simplicity, this unit is henceforth referred to as Scania’s Health Organization (HO). In this chapter we suggest how, in relation to the general development of Scania, the HO began to evolve and grow into a significant corporate resource of Scania. The strategic importance of the HO relates to the wealth of knowledge it accumulates about Scania’s employees and the company’s activities, which is undertaken through the daily activities of the health professionals who are employed by the HO. Progressively, the HO has grown larger, changing its strategic orientation from more traditional occupational health services geared toward cure and rehabilitation of illnesses or injuries, to health promotion, focusing on empowering people to adopt a ‘healthy lifestyle’ that is aligned with the principles of SPS. The HO’s manager reports to the Vice President of Human Relations, as
well as to the “Health Council” that is chaired by the CEO of Scania. According to the manager of the HO,
the strong support by our CEO for what we do around here is crucial to our legitimacy in the organization. When he started in the company many years ago, well before he became CEO, he was a typical technician and was primarily interested in production and engineering matters. But today he is also focused on our employees’ well-being, health and lifestyle as crucial elements to the company’s ability to perform and act according to the principles of the SPS. He’s a humanist today, not only an engineer. Of course, the company has also changed; we all understand that the behavior and attitudes of our employees are critical. We cannot focus on engineering matters only; we also need to look at how this production is achieved by the employees.
