Managers' experiences of promoting employees' health and work environment from a salutogenic perspective during organizational change

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1108/IJWHM-01-2021-0008
• Published date: 01 December 2022
• Date: 01 December 2022
• Pages: 75-88
• Subject Matter: Health & social care,Healthcare management,HR & organizational behaviour,Human resource policy,Employee welfare
• Author: Louise Fransson,Marie Lydell

Managers’experiences

of promoting employees’health

and work environment from

a salutogenic perspective during

organizational change

Louise Fransson and Marie Lydell

School of Health and Welfare, Halmstad University, Halmstad, Sweden

Abstract

Purpose –This study aims to describe the managers’experiences of promoting employees’health and work

environment from a salutogenic perspective during an organizational change.

Design/methodology/approach –Ten managers going through an organizational change, including three

men and seven women. The managers belonged to the same management team and was participating in

discussions with researchers regarding organizational changes. The managers were between the age of 32 and

59 and had between one and 25 years of experience in a managerial position. Semi-structured interviewswere

conducted, and the analysis was performed using qualitative content analysis with an abductive approach.

Findings –The experiences from the managers were described, and during the analysis, six categories

emerged. The categories were about the salutogenic theory sense of coherence, and therefore, the categories

were placed in the domains comp rehensibility, managea bility and meaningfulness . In the domain

comprehensibility, two categories emerged in the analysis; transparent managers create an understandable

change and continuous information contributes to comprehensibility. In the domain manageability, two

categories emerged in the analysis; clear structure provides manageable change and balance between

requirements and expectations provides manageable change. In the domain meaningfulness, two categories

emerged in the analysis; an open conversational climate creates meaningful participation and common

consensus contributes to meaningfulness in work.

Originality/value–This study highlights what it is like to be a manager during an organizational change and

describes how employees’health and work environment can be promoted. By being clear with information

about the change andbeing transparent in what is happening, an opportunity is created to promote good health

among employees during the change period.

Keywords Employees’health, Health promotion, Managers, Organizational change, Qualitative content

analysis, Salutogenic perspective, Sense of coherence (SOC), Work environment

Paper type Research paper

Introduction

Workplace health(to experience health at work) is an importanttopic, and employees spends

40 h per week if they have a full-time position according to the Swedish Work Environment

Authority(2015a). Duringthose hours, it is importantto promote health to enablemanagers and

employeesto cope with their tasks (Mayer andKrause, 2013). To be at work and perform duties

requires a good work environment, and it is important to consider both physical and

psychosocialwork environment (SwedishWork Environment Authority,2015b). Research has

shown that there are deficiencies in both the organizational and the social work environment,

whichcan lead to anxiety andsleep disorders (Gunnarsson et al.,2016).All individuals mayalso

experience different stress at work, so it is important that the organizational and socialwork

environment are suitable for everyone (Gunnarsson et al., 2016). This means that the work

environment mustbe adjusted for everyone (Mayer and Krause, 2013;Lydell et al., 2019).

With a pathogenicperspective, the focusis directed preventing disease,and this is the most

common perspective in studies in healthcare,but also in working life (Mittelmark et al.,2017).

Promoting

employees’

health

75

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Received 9 January 2021

Revised 29 July 2022

21 August 2022

29 October 2022

Accepted 31 October 2022

InternationalJournal of Workplace

Health Management

Vol. 16 No. 1, 2023

pp. 75-88

© Emerald Publishing Limited

1753-8351

DOI 10.1108/IJWHM-01-2021-0008