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34 Conclusions and Future Study Airport employees experience a variety of stressors that can affect their personal health and well-being. From workplace stressors such as a high workload or challenging new technology, to personal stressors such as workload and lacking work-life balance, it is imperative that airports find ways to help reduce these stressors and support employee well-being. Further, this synthesis report shows that there are numerous and varied approaches that airports are currently taking to focus on employee well-being. While not all airports have a dedi- cated employee well-being program in place, many have well-being programs that incorporate offerings to improve various aspects of their employeesâ lives; few well-being programs include only a single element. Each airport that participated in the data collection activities reported different types of well-being program offerings. Typically, these offerings are tailored to the needs of the airports or the available resources. Based on the project findings, the most commonly used well-being program offerings include the following: ⢠Employee assistance programs (EAPs) ⢠Retirement planning or counseling ⢠Financial education ⢠Fitness programs ⢠Nutrition counseling ⢠Wellness workshops ⢠Cessation programs ⢠Community service or volunteer programs Focus on Different Components of Employee Well-Being As can be seen in the variety of these offerings, airports focus on all of the different components of employee well-being: employee physical well-being (e.g., fitness programs, cessation pro- grams); mental well-being (e.g., EAPs); social well-being (e.g., community service); and financial well-being (e.g., retirement planning and financial education). The offerings that airports choose to implement depend on each airportâs specific situation. For example, some airports are limited in what they offer because they receive their well-being programs from the municipality that they are part of. In these situations, it can be difficult to tailor the well-being program offerings to the needs of the airport employees (e.g., offering sessions that meet the needs of 24/7 employees), and this continues to be a challenge for air- ports that are not responsible for their own well-being program. Other airports implement their own well-being programs and can use employee input to determine the best use of resources and present offerings that employees will value and that directly address the greatest stressors for their own employees. However, whether airports use well-being programs developed fully C H A P T E R 5
Conclusions and Future Study 35 in-house or created by a larger organization or municipality, there are programs in place that employees use to improve the various components of their well-being. One challenge that was noted during the study was specifically for GA airports. Often, when these airports are part of a larger authority, they are offered the same well-being program elements as the other airports. However, if there are only a few staff members at the GA airport, sessions or opportunities may not be easily accessible to those employees unless they are able to travel to one of the larger airports within the authority. GA airports that are not part of a larger authority or municipality typically do not have the resources available to develop programs to support employee well-being. Others may feel that it is not necessary to implement well-being programs because of the small number of employees these airports may have. However, the ability to reduce the stressors felt by employees is important, no matter how small the staff size. GA airport employees experience stressors just like other airport employees, and may have different or greater stressors depending on their specific airport and job. Because of the potential lack of well-being programs for GA airports identified through this study, developing resources to support GA airports in implementing employee well-being offerings may be an especially crucial focus area for future research efforts. As was stated in the Summary, as airports consider the needs for their employee well-being programs, this topic becomes exponentially more important with societal challenges, such as the novel coronavirus pandemic. This unprecedented impact on the global economy also has well-being impacts for airport employees. For the airport employees who are essential workers, and who must report to a work location that puts them in proximity with many people, stressors may be significantly increased. Airports will need to consider the types of well-being offerings that might benefit employees who are experiencing stress and decreased well-being due to COVID-19 and needing to work. Various well-being programs to support employees physical, mental/psychological, social, and financial stressors may be valuable to consider as employees may experience new stress in each of these areas. News stressors could be physical (e.g., getting sick from passengers in the airport), mental or psychological (e.g., stress of the unknown, anxiety about working during the pandemic), social (e.g., less camaraderie and com- munication with coworkers), or financial (e.g., furloughs, reduced hours). As airports recover from COVID-19 impacts and embark on initiatives to tackle the challenges of the aviation industry restart and recovery, employee well-being programs will be a key element to ensuring the safety and well-being of all airport staff. Further Study and Unanswered Questions Through study conducted as a part of this synthesis project, gaps in knowledge and future research needs were identified for airports as they consider employee well-being programs, their components, and how to implement the programs. Additionally, this section includes currently unanswered questions related to airport well-being programs; those are questions for which the data do not address the research needs or metrics are not currently tracked. The future research needs and unanswered questions include the following areas. Lack of Information Regarding Impacts or Outcomes In many cases, even when an airport has an employee well-being program in place, evaluation metrics or methods are not used to track the impact of these offerings or measure outcomes to ensure that the well-being programs are meeting the needs they were designed to meet. When evaluation metrics are used, often the only metric considered is participation rates. While impacts can be hard to track because of
36 Airport Workforce Programs Supporting Employee Well-Being personal information and Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act rules, there could be ways to track the success of employee well-being programs in an effective manner. As such, future research efforts should focus on ways to measure these impacts and outcomes, showing how effective the well-being programs and associated offerings are or identifying ways in which they may need to be modified to achieve the desired outcomes. Impact of the Different Needs Between 24/7 Staff and Daytime Workforces Study throughout this project showed that in many cases, more well-being programs are offered to employees who work during the day shift. However, there is no research available to indicate whether 24/7 staff would benefit from the same types of programming, if other well-being offerings would be of greater benefit to them, or how to be effective in reaching staff who work during the night shifts. Future research could examine the following four areas. They are the impact of 24/7 operations on well-being culture; the well-being needs of and challenges for 24/7 staff (e.g., biorhythm or sleep challenges): how to best meet the needs of 24/7 staff: and the specific stressors of different types of staff (e.g., office versus maintenance) who work different shifts (e.g., daytime shifts versus nighttime shifts). Examining these areas could determine whether different well-being offerings are needed, as well as how to best reach all airport staff through the employee well-being programs. Impacts of Generational Differences on Well-Being Programs Apart from a few types of well-being offerings (e.g., retirement planning or smoking cessation programs), most airports do not target or tailor their well- being programs to a specific audience. As such, outcomes such as attendance at or satisfaction with offerings is not measured for different demographic groups. While there may be genera- tional differences in the types of well-being programs offered, this is not something that the airports who participated in the study focused on. There were a few anecdotal examples of potential differences in the types of offerings employees would like to participate in; for example, employees of different generations may prefer different types of exercise classes (Zumba class versus yoga class). However, there were no firm findings regarding these differ- ences. Future research could examine differences in participation rates and satisfaction for various well-being program offerings based on demographic or employee differences such as generation, work location, or type of job. Using Employee Committees to Develop and Support Well-Being Programs As discussed previously in this report, an important element to support partici- pation in well-being is to allow employees to participate in decision making related to well-being offerings. However, there is a lack of data to show how effective these committees are in developing well-being offerings that employees want to use or to what extent committee-developed well-being programs positively affect health outcomes. Additional data or research would help to establish the best ways to involve employees in the development and upkeep of well-being programs. Tracking for Savings, Finance, and Budgeting As noted in the case studies, few airports are tracking metrics that can be used to support the utility of their well-being programs for airport employees. Data
Conclusions and Future Study 37 collection, analysis, and reporting have not been a high priority. Even when metrics are available, they are not used to help evaluate and understand well-being programs. For example, it might be possible to use metrics to track and analyze the relationship between well-being programs and workersâ compensation or insurance claims. The theory behind this analysis would be that if employee well-being programs are positively affecting well-being, employee physical health would also improve. This improvement in health would then result in fewer workersâ compensation claims or insurance claims for sick employees. As another example, airports could track the savings achieved through well-being programs (through number of insurance claims, for example) and compare this to the cost of these programs; if the benefits outweigh the costs, airports could then quantify the positive impact well-being programs are having both on their employees and the airportsâ bottom line. If airports can show a positive impact of the well-being offerings already in place, then they could likely use that information to request additional programs or funding or validate existing funding requests. Additionally, by tracking metrics along with the types of program offerings available, airports may be able to track impacts from the programs (e.g., improvements in safety scores). Using Social Interaction to Improve Well-Being Programming Many people in todayâs world thrive on competition or gaming. There are likely ways that this competitive nature could be translated into supporting employee well-being programs. For example, one of the airports that participated in a case example interview described how much employees enjoyed a step challenge put on by the airport and how motivated people were to beat their peer teams. This competitive aspect encouraged more employees to participate in the program. Additionally, another airport indicated that it uses cloud-based social communications to let employees share fitness information, outdoor photos, or other content related to employee well-being; employees enjoy sharing with each other in this way. There are likely other ways that this element of todayâs society could be incorporated to improve airport well-being programs.
