DIC’s Saitama Plant Wins Saitama Labour Bureau Director’s Incentive Award in the Fiscal Year 2016 Saitama Labour Bureau Awards for Health and Safety —Positive Workplace Creation mental health improvement initiative earns high marks—
- Sustainability
- News Release
Tokyo, Japan—DIC announced today that it’s Saitama Plant, located in Ina, Saitama Prefecture, received the Saitama Labour Bureau Director’s Incentive Award in the fiscal year 2016 Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (MHLW) Saitama Labour Bureau Awards for Health and Safety. Awards were presented on July 5, 2016. These awards are conferred on business sites in Saitama Prefecture that have outstanding occupational health and safety standards and are pursuing improvement initiatives viewed as setting an example for other business sites in the prefecture. The Saitama Plant’s introduction and practical application of the leading-edge Positive Workplace Creation initiative, which plant employees have worked as one to implement, earned high marks from judges.
As part of its commitment to ensuring sound operations, the DIC Group is working actively to promote both the physical and mental health of its employees. Traditionally, mental health initiatives have centered on assisting individuals suffering from mental health problems. The Saitama Plant has sought to change this focus, adopting an approach based on advanced theories designed to preclude such problems, and in fiscal year 2014 introduced the Positive Workplace Creation initiative. To enhance the benefits of this initiative, the plant also participates in the Positive Workplace Forum, organized by the Japan Productivity Center and the Department of Mental Health/Psychiatric Nursing of the University of Tokyo’s Graduate School of Medicine.
The Positive Workplace Forum endeavors to promote the Positive Workplace Creation concept and related concrete measures with the goal of supporting efforts to advance the physical and emotional well-being of employees and the productivity of workplaces. These efforts have created a new framework for primary prevention, that is, for an affirmative approach that emphasizes mentally healthy employees and the creation a workplace culture that inspires a sense of belonging—evidenced by positive employee attitudes and an inherent desire to perform－to prevent mental health problems from occurring in the first place. Recognizing the value of psychosocial resources in the workplace, the Forum also encourages respect for the individual and endorses efforts to enhance the fairness of workplace organizations, as well as their ability to support employees.
The Saitama Plant has also established a Positive Workplace Creation Committee, which is charged with encouraging workplace unity, as well as the Emotional and Physical Health, Positive Workplace Creation and NigiWAi Creation subcommittees, thereby creating a robust structure for promoting its Positive Workplace Creation initiative. In fiscal year 2014, the plant received a Positive Workplace Starter award—given to companies recognized as having excellent frameworks in place for promoting efforts—from the Positive Workplace Creation Forum.
The Saitama Plant will continue to build on its record of achievement and multiple awards to achieve further improvements in productivity.
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