ERGONOMICS, SUSTAINABILITY AND PERFORMANCE

Abstract

In the context of the global crisis there is an increasing interest regarding sustainability. While the focus of debate was at the beginning mainly on society level, sustainability issues have currently a growing relevance for social and economic organizational performance. The paper aims to present arguments for considering ergonomics as a support for organizational sustainability. Based on sustainability reports and ergonomics literature review, the paper highlights the essential role of work systems’ ergonomic design and finds supporting arguments about ergonomics interventions’ impact on organizational performance. The contribution of the paper focuses on helping companies and top managers to understand the impact of ergonomics interventions on decreasing social and economic costs, related especially to occupational health and safety hazard prevention.