Ergonomic Chairs and the Emergency Services

The emergency services and communication centers play an integral part in maintaining the safety of the public – whether it be in large metropolitan areas or rural locations. These workers are responsible for dispatching emergency calls, responding to reports of intruders, and providing emergency services where necessary. Thus, concentration on the task at hand is imperative to ensure that they can successfully do their job in the most productive and efficient way possible. 

With this in mind, you’d be surprised at the correlation between comfortable work chairs and a worker’s general productivity levels. Given that most workers – particularly those in the emergency services – spend more than 40 hours a week at work, comfort levels and general health and wellbeing when seating are essential for any worker. 

Studies have found that poor seating has a negative effect on employee efficiency within the workplace, with research stipulating that most adults spend at least 40% of their energy compensating for unfavourable posture due to an uncomfortable chair. This equates to roughly the same amount of energy that goes into work performance.

In order to be able to concentrate at work within these emergency environments, you must be able to block out external influences and focus on the task at hand. Physical strain, such as tension or pain in the back and neck areas, prevents this, and the distraction results in thought processes being interrupted. While in most clerical roles this delay in attention may not be as much of an issue, with high-pressured job roles that necessitate immense concentration and quick decision making, ergonomic chairs and an integral option for most emergency service offices – particularly in the environment we currently see ourselves in with the NHS and police force; the epitome of ‘essential workers’ across the country. 

So why buy a comfortable, ergonomic chair? 

There are many answers to this question, but to help you understand the importance of ergonomics within the emergency services, I have listed a few benefits below. These include; 

Ergonomic chairs have been renowned for improving productivity 

Most reports of offices and workplaces that have implemented ergonomic chairs have seen a rise in productivity by more than 25%. By designing a chair that facilitates good posture, less exertion, fewer motion and better heights and reaches, it seems fairly logical to presume such a claim holds true. Productivity is essential with any workplace – particularly within the emergency services – with workers enduring long hours and responding to phone calls, where split decisions and reactions are the difference between life or death in some cases. 

Ergonomics improves the quality of performance

Poor ergonomics leads to frustrated and fatigued workers that don’t do their best work. When the job task is too physically taxing on the worker (which can be the case within the emergency services), they may not perform their job the way they were trained. In fact, it has been reported that ergonomic chairs have led to a 67% reduction in errors. 

Ergonomic chairs create a better safety culture 

Ergonomics positions your company as one that is committed to health and safety as a fundamental value. This is obviously imperative within the emergency services, as health and safety are at the core of what you do. The cumulative effect of the previous benefits list above is a stronger safety culture for your company. Healthy employees are your most valuable asset; creating and fostering the safety of health culture at your company will lead to better human performance for your organization.