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Our Five Favorite Ergonomic Lenses

May 10, 2022

In 1988 Grandjean defined ergonomics as “Fitting the task to the person”. What a fantastic definition, for it is short, easy to understand and so simple in its elegance as it universally applies to what is at the heart of ergonomics. Yet at the same time, ergonomics...

Three Process Improvements That Also Improve Ergonomics

Apr 2, 2022

Most companies are always looking for advancements in the workplace that lead to higher profits, improved quality, and a reduced cycle time. The process improvements that lead to these three items often go hand-in-hand with ergonomic improvements. We have identified...

Ergonomics Education: A Journey to Excellence

Mar 14, 2022

Written by: Hannah Brinza, M.S. Do you want to reduce injuries at work? Ergonomic Education is a good start. It is truly remarkable what humans are capable of when they have a unified vision and are all working towards the same goal. Illustrations can include...

Workplace Injury 101: How Do Muscles, Tendons, or Ligaments Get Injured?

Feb 2, 2022

Reducing the risk of injury in the workplace is a common goal of all who are involved with workplace health and safety. Typically these efforts involve making some sort of change which results in a reduction of an individual’s exposure to known or suspected injury...

Integrating Safety Culture into Process Design

Jan 1, 2022

Author: Umayr Mahbub Safety culture is the ways in which safety is managed in the workplace, and often reflects the attitudes, beliefs, perceptions and values that employees share in relation to safety. It has also been described as “how an organization behaves...

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Why Sandalwood

Why Sandalwood? Because we care. Our team genuinely cares about the well-being of our clients and is passionate about what we do.
Sandalwood Engineering and Ergonomics has been practicing ergonomics since 1989. Our ergonomists have experience in a variety of industries including manufacturing, transportation, fulfillment, beverage, and service. We are also experienced in new product design, equipment design, office space and remote workspace. Members of our injury prevention team maintain certifications from the BCPE and CCCPE.
In addition to our experienced staff, Sandalwood has access to a vast variety of tools, resources, and subject matter experts. We are continuously seeking the latest research and tools to ensure we maintain expertise in the field.

How is it done?

Sandalwood is comfortable, confident, and able to provide support assessments virtually and/or in-person. We have and can meet and provide information over the web and/or with our boots on the ground at a client facility.

Why is it Important?

Good ergonomic practices can improve employee health, productivity, moral, costs, and quality. It is important to first identify hazards and analyze risk of injury. Once a risk is understood, solutions can be developed to mitigate its effects on the employee and the company.

Why is it Important?

Work-Related Musculoskeletal Disorders may emerge as a result of poor ergonomic practices. These disorders can result in costs for both the employer and worker. Examples of these costs include medical visits, worker’s compensation payments, absenteeism, loss of productivity, and increased administration costs. A primary contributor to this can be inadequate or un-optimized workstation design.

Aches and pain are not a “normal” part of the job and can often slow the operator or lead to degradation in quality. Ensuring an optimized workstation will improve operator efficiency and product throughput and significant impacts on the bottom line.

Do you or your employees experience any pain or discomfort in these areas?

Low Back Pain
Wrist Pain
Neck Pain
Shoulder Pain
Tingling or numbing
Muscle weakness

Decreased grip strength
Cramping
Decreased range of motion
Joint stiffness
Visual fatigue
Frequent headaches

Sandalwood’s team of ergonomists and industrial engineers can leverage new technology to review and assess workstations on site or remotely to reduce the risk of injury!

Why Is This Important?

Employee health and safety isn’t just important, it’s the law. Good employee health and safety can improve productivity, morale, costs, and quality. We work to provide for ourselves and our families, so it’s important we stay safe and healthy while doing so.

Why Sandalwood?

We are the experts. Members of our Injury Prevention team live health and safety and it’s ingrained in the whole of what we are, what we do, and what we value. We also have a vast variety of tools and resources at our disposal.

How Is It Done?

Sandalwood is comfortable, confident, and able to provide support virtually and/or in person. Our team members are aware of the times we are all living in and have adapted. We can meet and provide information over the web and/or with our boots on the ground at a client facility.

Why is This Important?

Work-Related Musculoskeletal Disorders (WMSD’S) can emerge as a result of poor ergonomic practices. These disorders can incur significant costs for both employers and employees. The primary function of job rotation is the reduce exposure time to risks that contribute to WMSD’s, which reduces overall incidence and severity of WMSD’s.

In addition, job rotation has been shown to:

Increase productivity and quality
Increase employee skillset, allowing more flexibility in staffing
Increase innovation and improve work process efficiency
Reduce absenteeism and turnover
Reduce boredom and complacency

How is it done?

Our job rotation projects include both on-site and virtual components.

On-site

In order to create effective job rotations that will have an impact on your workplace, our job rotation experts will come to your facility to help you determine which jobs can be included in a rotation and to collect all data relevant to our assessments.

Virtual

Once our data collection is complete, our team will analyze the data to assign ratings to all the jobs to be included in the rotations. This allows us to pair high risk jobs with low risk jobs and ensure that the physical demands of each rotation vary significantly between each job. Rotation schedules can be created for multiple scenarios (two-way, three-way and four-way rotations) to provide employers with multiple options or rotation schedules can be created for a specific scenario dictated by the employer. Once completed, our analyses and rotation schedules are presented to our customers for review and feedback. Lastly, we can support the implementation of job rotation schedules either on-site or virtually.

Why Sandalwood?

missing piece We are a one-stop-shop for launching job rotation for any employer from conception to implementation. Our experts tailor our services to meet the needs of our customers by collaborating with them throughout the entire process. We do not offer cookie cutter solutions for job rotation because the needs of employers vary significantly.

Why Sandalwood?

Certified Project Managers
Corporate Software Solution Partnerships
Experience in Various Industries
R&D and Product Development Experience
Manufacturing Facility/Process Optimization Experience

Why is it Important?

Work-Related Musculoskeletal Disorders emerge as a result of poor ergonomic practices. These disorders can result in costs for both the employer and worker. Examples include medical and worker’s compensation payments, absenteeism, loss of productivity, and increased administration costs. One main culprit of these disorders is not having suitable and standardized office furniture and equipment for employees.

Do you or your employees experience any pain or discomfort in these areas?

Low Back Pain
Wrist Pain
Neck Pain
Shoulder Pain
Tingling or numbing
Muscle weakness

Decreased grip strength
Cramping
Decreased range of motion
Joint stiffness
Visual fatigue
Frequent headaches

Experiencing aches and pains while working is not a “normal” part of the job. Proper ergonomic practices can help alleviate and eliminate these unpleasant ailments. After all, you spend 40+ hours per week working, why not make it pain free?

If you start to experience discomfort, listen to your body as it is trying to tell you something and address things as soon as possible.

Why is it Important?

97% of all organizations believe that Project Management is critical to business performance and organizational success.¹ Even with this close to unanimous consensus, nearly 50% of all projects are not completed on time and on budget.²

Does your organization need project assistance in any of these areas?

Cost Management
Schedule Management
Risk Management
Quality Management
Communications Management
Stakeholder Management
Resource Management
Scope Management

No project is guaranteed to be a home run, but a strong array of Project Management tools can increase organizational confidence in a successful outcome.

1 – PWC. (2012). Insights and Trends: Current Portfolio, Programme, and Project Management Practices.
2 – The Standish Group International, Inc. (2015). CHAOS Report 2015.

How is it done?

Sandalwood Project Management services can be rendered either in-person or virtually. Solutions typically take the shape of one of two standard approaches or a combination which is largely determined by the structure of the customer organization. Both approaches begin with a needs analysis workshop to determine the requirements and scope of support to be provided.

Project Management Office (PMO)

The PMO approach provides support to an organization that already has a project focused structure. Sandalwood will provide existing project teams with PMO services through staff and solutions that will enhance project transparency and actively reduce risk.

This is done through a subset of practices including implementation of a Project Management Information System (PMIS) or adaptation of an existing organization PMIS, KPI development for project monitoring/controlling, and design of stakeholder communication strategies (working team up through executive level).

Cross-Functional

The Cross-Functional approach provides support to functional-centered organizations. Sandalwood provides trained Project Managers who will become integrated within functional teams and work to manage projects from within.

This is done through methods such as implementing Project Management best practices within the functional teams, and centralizing information into a Project Management Information System (PMIS) for use by a PMO.

Why Sandalwood?

male tech Sandalwood is pleased to offer solutions above and beyond the traditional ergonomic assessments. With an in-depth knowledge of various digital human modelling software suites, integration and adoption to your health and safety programs has never been easier. Sandalwood is experienced in ergonomic program design as well as industry leaders in digital human modelling services. We have a diverse team that is able the leverage the results from the digital human model to provide in depth risk assessments of future designs and current state. Sandalwood is also able to pair these assessments with expertise and provide guidance on the best solution for you. Sandalwood is also on the forefront of emerging technologies and able to integrate Motion capture, Wearables, and extended or virtual reality into your ergonomic program.

How is it done?

Whether in-person or virtual, our services can be tailored to provide the greatest value to your organization and employees.

In-Person

The ergonomist will meet on-site to review the workspace and work on site to collect the required data for assessment. Depending on the nature of the tasks our team can identify the best assessment methodology to capture the inherent risk of a job or task. This can include capturing work with Motion Capture devices or wearables to understand the physiological demands.

The ergonomist is able to work with the employees if desired to coach on best ergonomic practices for setting up elements in the workstation to meet their individual needs.

Finally the ergonomist will create and deliver a report that includes what was identified, assessed and discussed as well as recommendations for moving forward.

Virtually

Here at Sandalwood we are industry leaders in upfront design and assessments. The ergonomist is able to work down a series of paths which include the assessment of 3D modelled designs prior to purchase or delivery of the final product. With augmented or virtual reality Sandalwood can leverage its knowledge of assessment tools to understand the demands of the job prior to bringing it into reality.

The ergonomist is able to assess for a wide variety of anthropometries and select those that best represent your workforce. A detailed report outlining areas of risk and recommendations would be created and delivered.

How is it done?

Whether virtual or in-person, our training and assessments can help an employee understand and practice proper ergonomics.

In-Person

Training content is developed and reviewed with customers to meet their areas of interest and it is delivered on the client site.

Ergonomist meets on-site to interview and assess the employee’s workspace. Coaching on ergonomic practices is provided to facilitate employee understanding.

The ergonomist will create a report that includes what was discussed in the assessment as well as recommendations for moving forward.

Virtually

Training content is developed and reviewed with customers to meet their areas of interest and it is delivered virtually.

Employee will send photos of their workspace to be reviewed by an ergonomist. The ergonomist will then meet individually with the employee to review pictures and use their expert judgement to provide feedback tailored to their needs. Proper ergonomic training is given to employees during the 1:1 session. The ergonomist will create a report that includes what was discussed in the assessment as well as recommendations for moving forward.

Employee Newsletter

Each month, for over eight years, the Sandalwood back office team has produced an employee-centered newsletter. The intention of the newsletter is to showcase our team, what’s happening with our projects and what’s happening internally at Sandalwood. It started out as a few pages back in 2015 and has grown to be over 50 pages each month!!

Employee Referral Program

Sandalwood encourages our team through an employee referral bonus, to refer qualified candidates for open positions in our organization. We look at this as a great way to find new hires who are aligned with our mission, vision and core values.

Hybrid / Remote Work

The Sandalwood team are pioneers in working from home as this has been a standard practice for many of our remote team members for over a decade. Our desire to enable work/life balance for our team enables us to encourage our team to work from home as often as possible, while supporting customer work onsite as needed and dictated by individual projects.

Robust Onboarding

Each new hire at Sandalwood, whether they are in Canada, the US or Mexico, goes through our thorough and all-encompassing onboarding process. We do this to help new team members acclimate to Sandalwood, our processes, people and customers.

Interesting Project Work

One of our key annual corporate objectives is to “Perform Interesting, Highly Valued Work” and we take great measures to ensure that each of our team members is working on projects that are stimulating, motivating and exciting.

Competitive Salary & Benefits

Sandalwood strives to pay competitively but using data regarding industry standard compensation for a role. Our comprehensive benefits package includes healthcare, dental, vision, LTD & STD, life insurance, 401(K) and RRSP. Our goal is to offer salaries and benefits that are fair relative to our industry to attract and retain top talent.

Standardized Processes

Sandalwood endeavors to provide a process-driven operating culture by using predictability, repeatability, and visibility in the development of our back-end and customer-facing delivery processes. This results in a suite of tools that allow our team to focus on customer satisfaction.

Staff Days, Social Events & Team Meetings

Through Sandalwood’s history, the team has been distributed in one way or another. In order to ensure that our culture was being maintained and to meet up with the team from time-to-time, we have always prioritized in-person staff days. These days provide a chance to get together in-person, catch-up, discuss Sandalwood news, internal and external updates, new tools or partners and technologies.

Employee Recognition

Recognition helps the team see that Sandalwood values them and their contributions to the success of their team and the company overall. We get a chance to recognize our peers and leaders when they show commitment to our core values. We hope it helps our team build a sense of security in their value to the company, motivating them to continue striving for the best for our customers. Sandalwood is committed to recognizing our employees for their achievements made in support of corporate business objectives and high-quality customer service. Recognizing the accomplishments of employees helps contribute to a supportive work environment.

Mentorship

Our volunteer mentorship program provides our team with opportunities for personal and professional growth. We want to help broaden networks, participate in career planning and provide confidence building and support. We love how the mentorship program increases team engagement and helps to communicate company culture, core values, mission and vision.

Tuition Reimbursement

Sandalwood views tuition reimbursement as our opportunity to show our team that we are dedicated to helping them learn and grow on the job.

IDP & Goals

Sandalwood uses individual development plans (IDP) and goal setting as tools in our performance management suite to assist employees in personal and professional development. Its primary purpose is to help employees reach short and long-term career goals and to contribute to growing their skills in areas important to them and important to deliver of customer projects.

Highway to Health

Sandalwood’s highly engaging health & wellness program was developed to encourage the team’s wellbeing in key areas such as: physical health, mental health, financial health and personal/professional growth. Using a very cool and engaging team approach, Sandalwoodians are encouraged to participate and flourish in areas important to them.

Home Office Ergonomics Program

As experts in Ergonomics, our Sandalwood team members are encouraged to complete in our Home Office Ergonomics Assessment training to ensure their home office setup is optimized.

Employee Assistance Program

Our EAP support helps the team in managing personal issues. It is our hope that it helps to improve employee engagement, morale, and productivity by reducing workplace conflict, absenteeism and presenteeism. Ideally, we are promoting a healthy work environment that helps to attract and retain talented individuals.

office_workers

Why Sandalwood?

We are a one-stop-shop for a “not one solution for everybody” problem. Offer in-person and remote services. With our experience in an array of different industries, we are able to develop solutions to a multitude of ergonomic problems, and in turn, tailor those solutions to meet individual needs.

Sandalwood ergonomists are experts in office ergonomics and can offer proactive and reactive solutions to reduce the risk of injury.