Accident Prevention e-News October 2008	Volume 3/Issue 10/Oct 2008
In this Issue: TTC drug and alcohol testing: a test case scenario for Canadian employers Lean manufacturing and healthy work practices Healthy Workplace Month: putting your workplace to the test Emergency preparedness for small business (and others)

TTC drug and alcohol testing: a test case scenario for Canadian employers
By Nadia Pazzano

The Toronto Transit Commission (TTC)’s recently proposed drug and alcohol policy, which allows for the testing of various employees in safety-sensitive jobs, opens the door to the continuing debate between an employer’s right to conduct safe business operations and a worker’s right to privacy and freedom from discrimination.

Unlike our neighbours to the south, drug and alcohol testing is fairly uncommon in most Canadian workplaces. Where such policies exist, they are usually found in safety sensitive environments and are subject to various restrictions. The fundamental difference seems to have crystallized in the issue of random testing. While the US approach to random testing tips the balance in favour of management rights and safety, courts, tribunals and human rights bodies across Canada have strived to protect workers’ rights to privacy and freedom from discrimination under human rights laws. In most cases, Canadian employers need a good reason to suspect that there is a risk of impairment before testing is justified.

The most hotly contested issue of the TTC’s proposed policy, which was introduced on September 12, was indeed random testing. Initially, the TTC’s policy was designed to permit testing for safety sensitive positions in six different circumstances:

1. when applying for a job
2. for cause (reasonable suspicion of impairment)
3. after an incident
4. where there is a violation of a last chance or rehabilitation agreement
5. after treatment
6. randomly

On September 18, nine city councillors rejected the random testing portion of the policy. The decision was made after hearing submissions from city councillors, unions and the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, and reflects a distinctly Canadian approach to the drug and alcohol debate.

The law on drug and alcohol testing
In the US, the power to engage in drug and alcohol testing is legislated, and targets particular industries such as aviation, pipeline, public transportation, railroad, ships, trucking, etc. Currently, Canada has no legislation governing drug and alcohol testing. The guiding force for Canadian drug and alcohol policies comes in the form of the authoritative decisions of courts, boards, tribunals and arbitrators.

In Entrop v. Imperial Oil Ltd., ¹ (Entrop), the seminal case on drug and alcohol testing in Ontario, the Ontario Court of Appeal held that pre-employment and random drug testing violates Ontario’s Human Rights Code. The court’s finding was driven somewhat by the scientific realities of the drug testing method—urinalysis. Unlike alcohol testing, urinalysis is incapable of measuring impairment at the time of testing. It can only detect drugs in the system. This means that someone using drugs over the weekend, but who is sober for work during the week, can still produce a positive result.

Because the test cannot measure present impairment, it provides no indication as to whether an individual was able or unable to carry out the essential functions of a job at the time of performing it. Based on this “fundamental flaw,” the Court of Appeal found that random or pre-employment drug testing was not reasonably necessary to accomplish Imperial Oil’s purpose of achieving safety, and therefore could not be considered bona fide occupational requirements under the code. However, the court found that drug testing that is post-incident or for cause in safety sensitive environments was permissible, but only as one facet of a larger rehabilitative assessment. With respect to random alcohol testing, the court accepted that such testing was legitimate in safety sensitive positions provided individuals are accommodated to the point of undue hardship. Unlike drug testing, alcohol testing through a calibrated breathalyser is capable of determining impairment at the time of the test.

A subsequent Ontario arbitration, Imperial Oil Ltd. v. C.E.P., Local 900, ² dealt with a new form of oral buccal swab testing, which can indicate impairment from marijuana at the time of testing. However, because results are not instant (the oral sample must be taken to the lab and test results are not available for days later) the arbitrator concluded that immediate danger to the safety of workers and the public could not be assessed, and in the circumstances privacy interests under the collective agreement would take precedence. The arbitrator noted that, even if impairment could be immediately detected, it is doubtful that such testing could ever be justified without reasonable cause:

… the fact remains that a significant number of major employers in highly safety sensitive industries in Canada have founded their alcohol and drug testing policies on principles of reasonable cause and have not attempted to force upon their employees mandatory, random, unannounced drug testing. To the extent that those employers and industries have functioned well and have operated safely… there is little reason to conclude that random, unannounced drug testing of all employees is, of necessity, an essential element for a successful alcohol and drug policy. ³

In January 2008, the Ontario Court of Justice upheld the decision.

Recently, the Quebec Court of Appeal rejected the random alcohol and drug testing components of a policy in Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union v. Goodyear Canada Inc. ⁴ The court held that both random alcohol and drug testing for existing employees in safety-sensitive positions within a tire manufacturing plant did not constitute a reasonably minimal infringement on individual rights under the Quebec Charter. In the court’s opinion, the place of business operations did not constitute a highly safety sensitive workplace and, moreover, there was no real link between the company’s injury record and impairment on the job. As was the case in Entrop and other cases, the court upheld other types of testing, including for cause and after a major incident.

Unlike random testing, pre-employment testing has garnered a less consistent approach across the country. While it was made clear by the Ontario Court of Appeal in Entrop that pre-employment drug testing violates the code, the Alberta Court of Appeal in Chiasson v. Kellogg Brown and Root (Canada) Co. ⁵ allowed pre-employment drug testing in the arbitral context. The ruling was in connection with Mr. Chiasson who took the required drug test upon being hired and was terminated nine days into his employment when the test came back positive for marijuana. The court held that such a policy was not discriminatory and there was a clear connection between the purpose of the policy (safety) and the exclusion of even recreational users of cannabis from the workplace. The court clarified that if its decision derogated from the finding of the Ontario Court of Appeal in Entrop, then it chose not to follow that decision.

What a reasonable drug and alcohol policy would look like

Drug and alcohol testing will be of particular interest to Canadian employers conducting business in safety-sensitive environments. While there is some divergence of opinion on the circumstances under which drug and alcohol testing is permissible across Canada, some guiding principles have emerged. ⁶

• Alcohol and drug testing can be conducted in safety sensitive positions where there is reasonable cause (e.g., impaired behaviour or the smell of alcohol on one’s breath), or after an incident or accident occurs.
• Alcohol and drug testing is permitted in safety as well as non-safety sensitive positions where an employee returns to work either 1) post rehabilitation and as part of a monitoring program or 2) as a condition of continued employment after breach of a last chance agreement. Such testing must be conducted on a case-by-case basis and as negotiated with the union in unionized environments.
• Currently, the law does not allow for the use of random drug testing in either safety or non safety-sensitive positions. Such policies should be avoided.
• The law provides some leeway for random alcohol testing in safety sensitive positions, but only where it can be established that the testing is a bona fide occupational requirement (i.e., no supervision, chronic problem…) Arbitrators have generally refused to consider both random drug and alcohol testing as part of implied management rights.
• An employee's refusal or failure to undergo a test (where the test is warranted) may be grounds for discipline. However, discipline should be assessed on a case-by-case basis rather than automatic.
• The extent to which pre-employment testing is permissible varies across jurisdictions.

In all cases, employers contemplating the introduction of drug and alcohol policies will have the burden of demonstrating the reasonableness of their policies in the context of their specific workplaces. Processes for accommodating to the point of undue hardship will also be a key component of any successful policy, and the principles above will always be subject to any specific wording on testing that appears in a collective agreement.

Could random drug testing ever be justified?
It is not surprising that the random testing portion of the TTC’s proposed policy caused the most consternation. Being asked by an employer to urinate in a cup or provide a saliva sample at will probably rates number one on the list of invasive requests.

The idea of random drug testing in particular has attracted the most opposition from Canadian decision-makers in the context of both arbitration and human rights. It is difficult to say for sure, however, whether random drug testing will be forever outlawed. The difficulty is that drug and alcohol policies are usually assessed against the backdrop of a number of factors, including the specific work culture of the employer, the particular job functions being carried out, the size of the public served, the language in a collective agreement, and the ability of the test to measure present impairment.

Two possibilities
It has been suggested that random drug testing may be warranted in extenuating circumstances; that is, in some instances, the balance may be justifiably tipped in favour of safety over individual rights. Here are two examples:

• where “an employer could marshal evidence that compellingly demonstrates an out-of-control drug culture taking hold in a safety sensitive workplace.” ⁷ Where an employer can establish that there exists a systemic problem with drug and alcohol use among workers that is linked to a significant number of incidents, a random drug policy may be justified. The onus would be on the employer to establish that such a culture exists through objective and factual evidence. In this context, the more invasive testing might be better justified as an add-on to a longstanding existing policy that failed to correct the pattern
• where the parties have negotiated specific language in a collective agreement. Where employees readily consent to such testing through clear and unequivocal wording, such measures would be more difficult to challenge

Despite these hypothetical scenarios, employers must be cognizant that random drug testing by Canadian employers has, up to this point, been prohibited.

What we can expect from the TTC’s policy as a test case scenario
The TTC’s proposed policy elicited a vigorous response from within the Toronto Transit Workers’ Union. The union’s spokesman, Bob Kinnear has publicly denounced the TTC’s right to subject any TTC worker to testing under any circumstances. Nevertheless, many of the other testing methods proposed by the TTC have been widely accepted in safety sensitive workplaces. The real question is whether these measures are reasonable in the context of TTC operations. The issue of pre-employment testing will most likely illicit some further debate from human rights stakeholders.

Drug and alcohol policies must be customized to reflect the specific needs of a particular workplace, the public it serves, and the language in existing collective agreements. Therefore, although the TTC’s policy is a useful test case for the application of legal principles, its usefulness will be limited for employers in other industries. In any industry, however, one thing is certain: case law repeatedly shows that the policies that survive are the ones that strike a fair balance between management’s right to operate a safe workplace and workers’ rights to privacy and freedom from discrimination.

Nadia Pazzano is an associate with Stringer Brisbin Humphrey Management Lawyers; npazzano@sbhlawyers.com; www.sbhlawyers.com.

Endnotes
1. 2000 CarswellOnt 2525, 50 O.R. (3d) 18 (C.A.).
2. 2006 CarswellOnt 8621, 157 L.A.C. (4th) 225, upheld 2008 CarswellOnt 669, 169 L.A.C. (4 th) 257 (Ont. Div. Ct.)
3. Ibid. at 104.
4. [2007] J.Q. No. 13701 (QL), 2007 QCCA 1686.
5. [2007] A.J. No. 1460 (QL), 289 D.L.R. (4 th) 95 (C.A.), leave to appeal denied [2008] S.C.C.A. No. 96 (QL).
6. See Imperial Oil Ltd. v. C.E.P., Local 900, supra note 2 wherein the Board of Arbitration provided a useful description of what it referred to as the “Canadian model” for alcohol and drug testing.
7. Supra, note 2 at 127.

Lean manufacturing and healthy work practices
By Derry McDonell

Greg MacDougall wants to make one thing perfectly clear: “I’m not the safety guy, we all are.”

His actual title is manager, total quality system and senior lean coach at the Canadian division of Cogent Power Inc., a global designer and manufacturer of transformer cores and components, located in Burlington, ON. But for someone who doesn’t want to be seen as a “go-to” guy for safety, he along with company president Ron Harper and the manufacturing leadership team have been building a track record that many an OHS specialist would love to claim credit for.

Cogent’s Burlington operation, part of the international Corus Business Group, is in the business of slitting electrical steel and using it to manufacture four types of electrical steel cores used in transformers and other power generation equipment. Approximately 190 employees work in four shifts, including the packing and distribution facility. The work involves many types of physical risks, ranging from material handling issues—slips, trips and sprains—to potentially serious injury from machines and equipment.

But over the last 14 years, the company has transformed itself from being a below-average safety performer (29 recordable injuries per 100,000 hours worked in 1994) into an enviable model for any manufacturing operation (2.5 per 100,000 hours as of September 2008).

Initiating change
“It really got started in 1995 when Ron Harper came in as operating manager,” says MacDougall. “Ron came from the chemical industry, which has tighter standards generally, and so along with improvements in other areas of the business, he went after our health and safety performance.”

As Harper recalls, “When I started we were experiencing a lost-time injury a month.” His new direction for Cogent led to a comprehensive overall safety audit that identified, among other issues, a need for updated pre-start review requirements and improved machine guarding standards.

Consultants from IAPA were an integral part of this effort. “IAPA was a key partner in helping us go through the hazard identification and risk assessment aspect of this stage,” says Harper.

The next step was new training standards for machine and equipment operators.

At this point in the changeover, however, there was very little in the Cogent approach that could be called a radical departure from standard OHS practices. And while the initiatives did produce positive results in the company’s safety performance, there was a lot of up and down along the way.

An opportunity arose the following year, after the operations moved from Aldershot, ON to a brand new facility in Burlington. That’s when Cogent decided to completely restructure its entire operation using the lean manufacturing concept.

Introducing “lean thinking”
The term lean manufacturing refers to businesses that have incorporated operating principles laid out in the Toyota Management System. This system strives to eliminate all wasted activity from the product cycle, utilizing a philosophy of continuous improvement known as kaizen, the Japanese word for this process.

Kaizen involves identifying any of seven specific wasteful activities and eliminating them through improved workflow design. Nothing in the workflow cycle is sacred. Wasteful activity can be found in the product design, the materials used, how the product is built, stored, moved or shipped, as well as in the human resources involved at any point.

Another key element is the so-called “5S regime,” which focuses on maintaining a clean and efficient organization of the physical work area at all times. It’s commonly referred to as the housekeeping rules.

But why should health and safety managers care about this?

When one examines the steps involved in creating a lean manufacturing operation based on kaizen techniques, it’s clear they closely match those required of an effective health and safety management system; that is, to plan, audit, examine, adjust, review, update and continuously monitor results.

It also places responsibility for maintaining the system on every individual, not just management. For example, IAPA ergonomics specialist Ivan Szlapetis describes 5S as “making housekeeping everyone’s responsibility, which gives it a lot more credibility and emphasis than if it’s just a safety manager’s concern.”

Simply put, in order to run properly, the lean manufacturing model requires the development of an entire workplace culture. Indeed, because the process is so all-encompassing in its approach to the way the work is performed, improved health and safety performance is sometimes seen as a guaranteed side effect of the lean program. This is especially true of the 5S component.

Tom Howarth, IAPA’s principal consultant for the Burlington South Region, has observed this effect in other organizations that have adopted it.

“It just stands to reason that if you’re doing things more efficiently, including keeping the work area clean and well-organized, you’ve reduced the probability of injuries occurring,” he explains.

MacDougall agrees that 5S “should be the cornerstone of any management operating system.” However, he cautions against getting too focused on 5S, its just a tool. “It’s not a given that if you do 5S you will get the safety benefit… Most organizations implementing lean spend the bulk of their time focusing on tools and process management… without putting enough focus on behaviour, engagement and strategic issues.”

This wasn’t the case at Cogent. “We realized that the only way we were going to get continuous improvement in our safety performance was to build both a leadership team and a philosophy, and extend it throughout the organization,” he says.

Step one was ensuring that the entire health and safety program was included in the new lean approach, not just 5S or some other component.

At Cogent today, the management structure and the operating principles reflect a seamless integration of employee health, safety and well-being into the work itself. Health and safety is no longer a stand-alone issue, it’s what the employees do, as much a part of the job as slitting steel or shipping transformer cores.

Cogent’s revised leadership structure included adding a second production manager (and recently a third) to complement four shift supervisors and designating team leaders per department on each shift. It enhanced sustainability and allowed additional employees per shift time to work on continuous improvement initiatives.

Next came key implementation steps, such as

• setting up bi-weekly audits of each work area and building in plant condition goals and targets as one of seven key performance indicators in manufacturing. To ensure objectivity, team leaders audit others’ work areas instead of their own
• translating the kaizen philosophy of continuous improvement into training initiatives that teach team leaders and supervisors how to coach employees, rather than manage them, and to engage them in the process
• developing in-house safety standards , primarily the work of management and key employees, e.g., lead hands
• committed to reinvesting any lean system savings in the health and safety program . These savings are used to purchase improved personal protective equipment (PPE), tool storage boards, or anything else that enhances the work environment

Seeing results
Once the program was well along, results began to appear.

“We’re improving on all of the 5S initiatives, and we’ve significantly reduced our recordable injuries to nine this year, down from 23 at this time last year,” MacDougall notes. “And because every one of our injuries and incidents gets such attention paid to it, we’ve also managed our ability to better manage and learn from them.”

For example, “incidents” or “near hits” are further classified as either low or high in severity. “We go though each one in great detail to determine if it is a ‘one-off’ situation or evidence of a trend that needs to be dealt with,” says MacDougall. “If that’s the case, then we treat it as a ‘high-level’ incident, almost as if it was a lost time injury.”

A key focus these days is on what MacDougall terms “our hard case incidents,” particularly lacerations. “About a year and a half ago we got Ivan [Szlapetis] involved with these, and he showed us the root cause was largely our material handling methods,” he explains. “So we’ve made some key changes in the procedures and introduced new material handling requirements as well.”

Similar examination led to the introduction of Kevlar gloves and armguards for material handling to eliminate cuts and abrasions. Another analysis of near hits involving lift trucks led to more stringent training requirements for all drivers, who must now be externally certified.

Recently, adds MacDougall, “we just completed a kaizen on our packaging operations that will eliminate large skid handling which was one of our top three list of things to be dealt with from an earlier ergonomic lead kaizen. Safety including ergonomic consideration is a large component of our kaizen strategy and is highly evident in its application across Cogent.”

The last word
Has it been worth the time and effort? “Absolutely,” says Ron Harper. “Not only have we seen a 60% reduction in our recordable injury rate and no lost-time injuries over 2007, our productivity and profitability has increased significantly as well.”

Would he recommend the “lean” approach to health and safety improvement to other CEOs? “Yes, because there’s a direct relationship between the simplicity of your manufacturing processes, the level of your workplace organization, and the number of injuries that result,” he explains. “If you reduce clutter and the amount of movement required to do the work, you lower the risk involved.”

How IAPA can help
Lean manufacturing and ergonomics are natural partners, since the main goal of ergonomics is to reduce the risk of musculoskeletal disorders by matching job demands to employee abilities through the proper design of workstations, tools, environment, work schedules, policies and procedures.

IAPA ergonomic specialists can help you apply ergonomic principles that can help prevent injuries and boost worker productivity. To arrange for an IAPA consultant to visit your workplace today, call 1.800.406.IAPA (4272).

Adapted from an article that will appear in the November/December issue of Accident Prevention magazine.

Derry McDonell is a freelance writer with more than 20 years’ experience OHS and human resources management issues. He was the founding editor of Canadian HR Reporter; mcdonell.derry@gmail.com.

Healthy Workplace Month: putting your workplace to the test
By Claude F. Lacroix, Danielle Vincent and Daniel Mayer

Healthy Workplace Month, formerly just one week, is now a four-week celebration designed to introduce workplace health to Canadian organizations and support those already promoting healthy workplaces.

Effective this year, the leaders behind Healthy Workplace Month are the National Quality Institute (NQI) in collaboration with the Canadian Centre for Occupational Health and Safety (CCOHS). This year’s theme: Take the Healthy Workplace Challenge.

Each week, participating organizations are challenged to take part in a specific type of activity.

The first three challenges were Fit@Work, Support@Work and Green@Work. The final challenge, in Week 4, is Champions@Work.

Why a healthy workplace is important
According to NQI, healthcare costs are rising at twice the rate of inflation. In Canada, 50,000 strokes and 75,000 heart attacks occur every year. Eight percent of workers now take medication to treat depression and other mental-health conditions. Mental illness costs the Canadian economy $51 billion each year.

With stress both at home and at work, many employees feel undervalued and stressed, says NQI. This could have consequences on business performance. Research shows that happy, healthy employees are more likely to treat their customers well. They’re also more likely to stay with their employers.

“We hope that employers and employees will take advantage of the challenges and activities each week of the month,” said Allan Ebedes, president and CEO of NQI, prior to the launch of Healthy Workplace Month. “Experiencing the joy and sense of well-being from this celebration will hopefully encourage workplaces to initiate and sustain a healthy workplace strategy that incorporates NQI’s three critical elements: healthy lifestyle practices, occupational health and safety and the physical environment, and a culture of fairness and respect.”

More about Healthy Workplace Month, September 29 - October 26
The month encourages workplaces to foster a culture of trust and respect where people are happy and healthy. In a healthy workplace, people want to come to work.

To participate in some or all of the weekly challenges, organizations can register at www.healthyworkplacemonth.ca. The website offers

• short-term practical tools and ideas for organizations to help them participate
• case studies and long-term strategies for organizations to adopt as part of a comprehensive and integrated approach to organizational health

More about the weekly challenges

Week 1: Fit@Work . Health and lifestyle practices are one of the elements of a healthy workplace, and organizations can help encourage employees to start and maintain healthy behaviours at work. Providing information, resources, facilities or programs can make healthy choices easier.

Week 2: Support@Work .Workplace culture and environmentis one of the elements of a healthy workplace. A healthy work environment, where policies and practices meet the needs of employees, provides benefits for both the employer and the employee. For instance, a positive and supportive workplace culture

• fosters employee creativity and talents
• results in healthier, more engaged and more satisfied employees
• helps to reduce absenteeism, healthcare costs, and errors and injuries
• increases productivity and employee retention

Week 3: Green@Work . The physical environment and OHS is another element of a healthy workplace. A focus on environmental sustainability means adopting strategies that protect and enhance human and natural resources for the future. Organizations can provide employees with information, resources, programs, and policies to encourage earth-friendly habits. Living green is the better way to a healthier working environment.

Week 4: Champions@Work . Once you get your organization off to a healthy start, how do you sustain it? The successful development of a healthy workplace is built on and sustained by reinforcing the following five principles:

• an integrated management approach
• a focus on employee and organizational needs
• recognition that health is determined by many interdependent factors
• employer and employee joint responsibility
• assessment, evaluation and continual improvement

Learn more about Healthy Workplace Month at www.healthyworkplacemonth.ca.

How IAPA can help

• Attend any of these sessions at IAPA regional conferences:
  • “What is Stressing Your Employees – A View from the Psychotherapist’s Chair” and “Innovative Trends in Workplace Wellness Programs,” Showcase 2008 in Windsor, ON, October 28-29
  • “You Are What You Eat – Making the Right Choices,” Golden Horseshoe 2008 in Stoney Creek, ON, November 19
  • “Morale – Make an Impact in Your Workplace,” Future Forum 2008 in London, ON, November 25
    
    
• Access these free downloads from IAPA’s website:
  • Work-Life Balance: A Strategic Business Issue (also offered as a 3-hour workshop or a 1-hour presentation, and available on-site, on request)
  • Creating Healthy Workplaces, a comprehensive rationale for creating a physically and psychologically healthy work environment
• Psychosocial Risk Management: What Every Business Manager Should Know
• Free downloads on workplace stress
  
  
• Tap into healthy workplace consultation, training and programming. IAPA consultants can help your firm generate safety and performance advantages that result from achieving nationally recognized healthy workplace criteria. IAPA is an authorized provider of NQI Healthy Workplace courses and related materials, the NQI Progressive Excellence Program (NQI PEP) and related materials, and related services.

Emergency preparedness for small business (and others)

October 19-25 is Canada’s Small Business Week. Accident Prevention e-News marks the occasion with a look at a key health, safety and productivity issue for small and medium sized businesses: emergency preparedness.

Was your business impacted by SARS or Sunrise Propane? Directly or indirectly, events like these, regardless of where they take place, have the potential to seriously disrupt your operations.

Limited business continuity planning remains an issue today, placing Canada's small and mid-sized businesses at risk. That's the warning from Canadian industry associations and financial institutions who worry that too many of these companies are ill-prepared to deal with the effects of a pandemic, terrorist attack, major power outage, or natural disaster.

"Small business owners are very busy people who are focused on getting the next order out, the next sale made, responding to customers and working with suppliers. It can be difficult to find time to plan for something that we all wish will never happen," says Bruce McConnell, vice president, operations support & strategic initiatives, Business Development Bank of Canada (BDC) Consulting.

While some companies have developed contingency plans, most have not, according to Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters (CME). The organization says that this lack of preparedness not only threatens the viability of a large sector of the Canadian economy, but also jeopardizes the delivery of critical goods that depend on complex supply chain systems. This is a particular concern for companies with fewer than 100 employees, which make up 97 percent of goods-producing businesses and 98 percent of all service-producing businesses in Canada.

"Small and medium sized businesses are the engine of Canada's economy, yet they are particularly vulnerable because they have fewer employees and limited resources to respond with when an emergency happens," says Jean-Michel Laurin, vice president, global business policy at CME.

A pandemic, for example

The prospect of a worldwide flu pandemic is one instance of a large-scale threat that would have far-reaching consequences for Canadian workplaces.

The Public Health Agency of Canada, the World Health Organization and other experts warn that it's not a question of if, but when the next flu pandemic will strike. Considering Canada's reliance on trade, says the CME, the economy could suffer by as much as $60 billion or more if crossings at the Canada-US border were restricted.

When a pandemic strikes, the biggest impact will likely be on staffing. While some employees could be ill, others might be too frightened to come to work or have to stay home to care for affected children or other family members. Expect up to eight weeks of disruption, says BDC. It advises businesses to plan for

• up to 50% staff absences, for periods of about 2 weeks at the height of a severe pandemic wave
• lower levels of staff absences for a few weeks on either side of the peak

An influenza pandemic usually spreads in two or more waves, either in the same year or in successive influenza seasons. A second wave may occur within three to nine months of the initial outbreak, and may cause more serious illnesses and deaths than the first.

Under these circumstances, staff absences can occur for many reasons:

• illness/incapacity (suspected/actual/post-infectious)
• need to stay at home to care for the ill
• safer at home (e.g., avoid public transport)
• fulfilling other voluntary roles in the community
• looking after school-aged children, since schools are likely to be closed

A pandemic may also have other impacts on businesses:

• disruption of essential services like information, telecommunications, financial services, energy supply, and logistics
• customer orders that are cancelled or left unfilled
• disruption of supplies needed for ongoing business activity. Further problems can be expected if goods are imported by air or land over the Canada-US border
• the availability of services from sub-contractors may be affected (maintenance of key equipment is an area that merits close planning attention)
• demand for business services may be affected – demand for some services may increase (e.g., Internet access), while demand for others may decrease (e.g., certain types of travel activity)

Protecting your business

"Business continuity planning is not as complicated as it seems," says CME's Laurin. "You just have to think about how you're going to react if such a thing happens, and the steps you need to put in place to make sure you're ready, like making sure you have an updated list of all your employees' personal contact information."

Taking a proactive approach to business continuity planning can also give your company a competitive advantage, according to BDC's McConnell. "It demonstrates to employees, shareholders and customers that, should a pandemic or other emergency happen, you have a plan in place to continue supplying critical products or services."

A variety of resources are available to help businesses protect their employees and ensure that critical services or products are delivered during a disruption:

• a new emergency preparedness standard, released on October 8 by the Canadian Standards Association. IAPA emergency preparedness specialist Scott Hood describes CSA-Z731-03, Emergency Preparedness and Response, as “one of the best laid out standards I have come across in a long time. It’s taken a great deal of work out of setting up an emergency preparedness standard. The chapters in the standard give the rationale for the process, while the annex gives details of what to consider and direction on how you might begin to apply the standard”
• a complimentary continuity planning guide from CME to help manufacturers prepare for a pandemic (www.cme-mec.ca/national/index-en.asp), and a free online guide from BDC (www.bdc.ca/en/Business_continuity/Pandemic/default.htm)

How IAPA can help

1. Understand the true cost of injuries with the online Small Business Calculator. The calculator enables users to determine real, out-of-pocket expenses from injuries. You can choose from a number of injury scenarios and elements, including profit margins and industry wage rates, and then modify specific values to determine the real costs of your workplace’s most recent injury, or estimate the costs of a potential injury. The results can help you build a business case for injury prevention measures.
   
   
2. Visit IAPA’s online Small Business Centre. It helps firms with less than 50 employees understand and meet their health and safety obligations. Special features include
   
   • a critical first steps checklist
   • a business case for workplace health and safety, and
   • updates to the “Control Hazards” and “Measure, Evaluate, and Improve” sections, as well as the statistical documents examining workplace accidents and injuries
     
     
3. Attend the following sessions at IAPA regional conferences and trade shows:
   
   • Spill Containment: Best Practices and Ontario Legislation, Awareness 2008, Kitchener, October 21.
   • Fire Safety Plans: “It’s the Law,” Golden Horseshoe 2008, Stoney Creek, November 19.
     
     
4. Talk to an IAPA consultant, who can help you conduct an emergency preparedness gap analysis, explore opportunities to improve existing precautions, and help you create and conduct tests. Call 1-800-614-IAPA (4272).
   
   
5. Order Emergency/Disaster Guidelines and Procedures for Employees, a comprehensive book that can helps prepare you for eventualities arising from disasters or emergencies.

Adapted in part from “Continuity planning: is your company prepared for the worst,” an article prepared by the Business Development Bank of Canada.