Tis the Season for Injury Prevention

Rates of Workplace Injuries During The Holiday Season Are Often Barely Tolerable, Or Worse

With the peak holiday season upon us for warehousing and distribution, here are some sobering facts to consider:

• 5.2% of the US workforce is injured every year
• 8.5M US workers are at a “very high” risk of lumbar Injury
• 22M US workers are at “high” risk of lower lumbar Injury
• $60,000 The average direct cost of a back injury
• $15B Direct cost of lift-related injuries in the US
• $56B Direct and indirect costs of lift-related injuries

For major companies across Logistics, 3PL, and E-commerce retail, those numbers tell only part of the story. During the upcoming holiday season, they may experience peaks of two-to-five times their average supply chain volumes. This necessitates a deluge of new and seasonal hires to work in frantically busy distribution centers (DCs) – including hundreds of thousands of mostly inexperienced manual materials handlers (MMH). Novice workers generally have significantly higher rates of workplace injury. In theory, the volume of packages these employees are expected to move increases over time - beginning at 25% productivity and ramping up to 100% over the ensuing weeks. However, our IoT system data reveals that during their onboarding period, new hires often actually lift more than experienced workers, placing them at even greater risk of injury as they acclimate to the mental and physical demands of the job. This pattern is particularly pronounced during the busiest times of the year.

Distribution centers certainly train new and seasonal hires and invest in safety programs and safety equipment. But as they plunge into the holiday season, time and resources grow extraordinarily tight, and these standard approaches often prove woefully inadequate.

The result? Rates of workplace injuries during the holiday season are often barely tolerable, or worse. They are also largely preventable.

About the Authors

Michael Spinelli is Director of Data Science at StrongArm Tech, a safety science company that provides data collection, assessment, and safety solutions for the industrial worker.

Alberto Oca is a principal in the Operations & Performance Transformation Practice of A.T. Kearney, the global management consulting firm.