{"id":215595,"date":"2024-06-20T09:29:12","date_gmt":"2024-06-20T13:29:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=215595"},"modified":"2024-06-20T12:20:02","modified_gmt":"2024-06-20T16:20:02","slug":"improving-workplace-conditions-for-staff-by-staff","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2024\/06\/improving-workplace-conditions-for-staff-by-staff\/","title":{"rendered":"Improving Workplace Conditions: \u2018For Staff, by Staff\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

Connecticut correction officers and occupational medicine experts are perfecting a program designed to create a workplace culture of improved health, safety and well-being.<\/p>\n

\"Portrait
Correction workers make up the HITEC design team at the York Correctional Institution, Niantic, including, from left, Jeffrey Picardi William Abbott, Caleb Cooper, Lisa Hodges, Shamila Santini, Sean Stewart, Miles LaFemina, and David Hardison. (Photo provided by Janet Caldwell Cover)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Under the Health Improvement Through Employee Control (HITEC) program, front-line workers grouped into design teams use a participatory process to identify their workplace concerns, design solutions, and implement them for the benefit of other workers.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe HITEC front-line workers participate in creating solutions in their workplaces based on their knowledge of the problems and\/or areas that need improvement,\u201d says Janet Caldwell Cover, research assistant, outreach coordinator with UConn Health Occupational and Environmental Medicine, and HITEC advisor. \u201cInterventions created by the design teams are solutions to a problem that are collectively agreed upon and implemented with management approval.\u201d<\/p>\n

Workers designed wellness training for sleep, nutrition, substance abuse disorder, and mental health awareness. Other interventions addressed facility air quality, post-incident decompression spaces, and improvements to report-writing areas.<\/p>\n

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I really value being a part of the HITEC program, which recognizes that the most impactful workplace interventions come from those living it. — Matthew Brennan<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/blockquote><\/span><\/p>\n

\"Dr.
Dr. Martin Cherniack, UConn School of Medicine professor emeritus, is former co-director of the Center for the Promotion of Health in the New England Workplace (CPH-NEW) within UConn Health\u2019s Division of Occupational and Environmental Medicine. (Still frame from video)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

HITEC originated in 2006, when researchers from UConn Health and UConn Storrs started working with correction workers, their bargaining units, and Department of Correction administration to form a workplace participatory program. Originating with front-line correction officers, it expanded to include health services, counseling, commissary officers, food services, supervisors, addiction services and education personnel. As the program took shape, it earned the label \u201cfor staff, by staff.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dr. Martin Cherniack<\/a>, UConn School of Medicine professor emeritus, was the longtime co-director of the Center for the Promotion of Health in the New England Workplace<\/a> (CPH-NEW) within UConn Health\u2019s Division of Occupational and Environmental Medicine<\/a>. He and colleagues from UMass-Lowell have been studying the historically understudied correction workforce.<\/p>\n

\u201cI really value what people working on this have done, I think particularly in terms of members of the workforce, supervisors, front-line officers, who\u2019ve done some extraordinary things,\u201d Cherniack says.<\/p>\n

The corresponding website, hitec-doc.com<\/a>, houses resources including downloadable materials, published scientific research, programmatic tools, and video links that introduce the program and aid in the formation of new worker-based teams. It includes a video introduction featuring Cherniack, Caldwell Cover, correction workers, DOC administration and other partners, explaining the program, and showcasing some of the front-line staff involved in the project, reinforcing the \u201cfor staff, by staff\u201d mantra:<\/p>\n