Who are you?

I am Evelyn Morrison director of Proactive Works Ltd.

What does your business do?

Proactive Works is a business which offers a unique service, a service which is designed to reduce sickness absence and presenteeism, where the root cause is musculoskeletal injuries and psychological ill-health (e.g. stress, anxiety etc).

Presenteeism is defined as physically attending work when ill or unwell. This is becoming an increasing trend in the general workplace with one study reporting that, up to 60% of those questioned actually attended work while ill. This effects employee engagement and productivity significantly which ultimately results in lost revenue for businesses.

At Proactive Works, our service enables us to directly assess the levels of presenteeism, we believe that it should be a priority for all organisations to understand the impacts of having sick employees at work from a financial and employee wellbeing perspective. International research indicates that presenteeism costs are be up to seven times higher than sickness absence costs.

The absence costs to UK businesses is £609 per employee per year (CIPD, 2014) and the average number of days lost for both a musculoskeletal issue is 16 days and for a psychological ill-health issue is at 23 days per case, the costs are substantial.

To address each of these problems, our highly experienced physiotherapists complete a comprehensive musculoskeletal screen on the employee, with risk factors identified and addressed via a corrective exercise programme. With regards psychological ill-health we offer a training day which focusses on ‘Optimal performance through personal awareness’. The aim of which is help the employee understand their specific stress triggers, behavioural response styles and to equip them with the tools, which enable them to prevent and deal with their specific stressors.

Following Proactive Works intervention, there is a reassessment, which evaluate the overall impact of the service and ultimately, the return on investment for the employer.

Where are you based?

Proactive Works are based in Glasgow we currently work with organisations throughout the central belt of Scotland.

How did you get started?

As a physiotherapist I look for the risk factors that contributed to my patients’ injuries. One day in a clinic I had a eureka moment. It became obvious that if these risk factors had been identified before the onset of symptoms and a corrective exercise programme begun, that many injuries would have been prevented. This enabled the establishment of Proactive Works.

What is your background

I am a specialist musculoskeletal physiotherapist and I have worked in the both in the NHS and privately for nearly 10 years.

What is your top tip?

In the case of any service based business, the service needs to have a unique sales proposition (USP) which differentiates the service from the competition. Proactive Works USP is clearly focused on business presenteeism assessment and taking a proactive holistic approach to employee wellbeing rather than the current market model of costly reactive approach.

Has anyone helped you get started and how?

Brian Canavan from Optiva, helped me to determine my business strategy for which I got part funding from Skills Development Scotland’s Fexible Training Opportunities.

Useful contacts

http://www.skillsdevelopmentscotland.co.uk/our-services/flexible-training-opportunities/

http://www.locofoco.co.uk

http://www.optiva.me

Contact Details

http://www.proactiveworks.co.uk