The Ontario Workplace Safety and Insurance Board needs a transformational change if it is to keep up with the changing world of work demands, says WSIB chair Elizabeth Witmer.
“Dramatic change in the world of work demands a new era of innovation at the WSIB to better serve injured workers and employers,” Witmer said in an address to the Toronto Region Board of Trade recently. “In embarking on our transformation, we've learned four lessons about bringing change to a large, complex agency that could apply to any major organization.”
It is a necessary transformation to ensure the board’s long-term sustainability, she added.
“Despite our progress, the system remains in a delicate state,” says Witmer. “We must maintain our focus on healthy and safe workplaces, ongoing innovation and fiscal discipline to ensure the sustainability of the WSIB - to become the best workplace safety and insurance system in Canada.”
One area of focus for the WSIB has been on passive rehabilitation. The conventional wisdom in workers' compensation for decades has been challenged by studies showing that activity hastens recovery while inactivity delays it, she says.
“So we have transformed our approach, with return-to-work staff who engage with the worker and employer to facilitate a return to work,” says Witmer. “This has improved recovery and return-to-work outcomes, while reducing the number of workers requiring 100 per cent wage loss compensation.” (continued.)
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She also pointed to recent efforts to control WSIB health costs that had been rising by 8.5 per cent a year up to 2009.
“Today, by becoming more actively involved in helping injured workers access the right health care and providing Programs of Care and specialized clinics, we have improved health outcomes and reduced permanent impairments,” says Witmer. “As a result, our health costs have dropped by 11 per cent - while we have increased the amount spent on each worker.”
A true measure of success for the WSIB can be measured in the reduction of productive days lost in 2012, compared to 2009.
“Thanks to these initiatives, in 2012 there were over two million fewer productive days lost than in 2009,” she says, “a near-billion dollar injection into the GDP of Ontario.”
According to Witmer, that unfunded liability has dropped from a high of $14.2 billion in 2012 by more than $2 billion.
