When Jon Walker was in a car accident that sent him to a physiotherapist for back and neck treatment he got an idea.
Walker is the president of commercial and industrial painting company Lincor in B.C. He would often see workers getting the same injuries from carrying buckets, spraying walls and constantly lifting things above their heads.
To treat existing injuries and prevent future ones, he teamed up with injury treatment experts Harry Hosker and Elliott Usher of Boot Room Consulting to create Lincor’s Industrial Athlete program.
“We brainstormed how to bring physiotherapy to the worksite on a daily basis instead of waiting for someone to get an injury and miss work,” said Walker, who noted in 2017 four of his workers had similar back injuries.
The program starts with getting every participating employee’s health baseline with a screening at the UBC Allan McGavin Sports Physiotherapy clinic.
“Then they see where you are at, set goals to improve mobility, reduce injuries and design an individual stretching regime,” said Walker.
Participants check in every six months and weekly surveys are done to track progress and effectiveness. Lincor also worked to make the program accessible through Zoom, phone or text during working hours to be as convenient as possible.
The program also extends to the jobsite where crews perform warm-up and cool-down routines together rather than jumping into and out of work.
“Guys come in the morning and they start moving 50-pound paint buckets,” said Walker. “You wouldn’t go play hockey like that, so we thought why are people going to work every day and not doing that? It is crazy.”
Walker said crews started out feeling self-conscious about doing stretches and exercises together to start the day on large jobsites with other trades watching. But he noted now it has turned into one of the company’s most important team building tools.
“We put so much time and effort into training our people,” said Walker. “It is hard to find qualified construction workers. Our biggest problem is finding guys. We realize how hard they are working and we want to do whatever we can to address their health problems.”
Their efforts have garnered them the Independent Contractors and Businesses Association’s 2020 Gord Stewart Safety award which acknowledges individuals and companies for their efforts to prevent workplace incidents, injuries and illnesses. The award comes with $5,000 prize.
“For us to be recognized, it just feels like a big relief – to be able to say that construction workers are people and we care about them and their families,” said Walker. “It’s not about just bringing in new guys when someone gets injured.”
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