Occupational Therapy students partner with Norco to bring worker safety and wellbeing to life

For the first time, dairy manufacturer Norco has welcomed four Southern Cross Occupational Therapy students onto its NSW North Coast sites at Raleigh and Lismore to complete a 10-week student placement.

Most students go to hospital or community settings. The new Norco partnership is a novel opportunity to take their Occupational Therapy skills and knowledge and apply it in the corporate environment. This area of Occupational Therapy is called occupational rehabilitation.

Traevis Goode, Chloe Hoad, Lachlan Andrews, and Jerome Tadros, all in the fourth and final year of a Bachelor of Occupational Therapy, have collaborated with the Norco team to develop workplace education, assessment and resources aimed at preventing workplace injuries and enhancing employee wellbeing.

The focus at Norco Raleigh, a milk production site, was injury prevention. Traevis and Chloe did this by observing workers performing their tasks (known as a task analysis) and considering ways to make it safer. This may be with altered technique, the provision of aids/equipment or revised processes.

For the Agri-store at Norco Lismore, the focus was employee wellbeing. Lachlan and Jerome created the first of three (proposed) modules: sleep hygiene.

Norco’s General Manager for AgriSolutions, Adrian Reck, said the dairy co-operative aims to create a workplace culture that prioritises injury prevention and fosters the wellbeing of employees to improve job performance and contribute to the overall success of the organisation.

“We are thrilled to have partnered with the Southern Cross University to offer passionate students a real-life experience into a typical, everyday work environment, whilst the business gains valuable and fresh insights into workplace safety,” said Mr Reck.

“At Norco, we have some of the highest standards in workplace safety but we know there is always room for improvement, and by partnering with the Southern Cross University we can be confident that our policies and procedures are meeting best practice and remain relevant for our modern team.

“It’s been a delight to have Traevis, Chloe, Lachlan and Jerome be part of our team, who have all given us significant value across this important part of the Norco business and assist us in being the premier agriculture services provider in our heartlands,” Mr Reck added.

Maggie Scorey, Southern Cross University’s Work Integrated Learning Academic Coordinator for Occupational Therapy, said the new partnership between Southern Cross University and Norco had provided fantastic learning opportunities for students in a large rural corporate setting.

“As Occupational Therapists we focus on the things that people want to do, need to do and have to do,” said Ms Scorey.

“The Occupational Therapy students have applied occupational therapy frameworks when analysing workers activities in their workplace environment. The students have had many rich learning experiences at Norco. We thank Norco and the University’s Clinical Placement Supervisor Peter Irving for the opportunities this placement has provided.”

Peter Irving is an experienced occupational therapist who has worked for more than 20 years assisting injured workers back to work and providing training and advice to reduce the likelihood of injury to workers and providing occupational rehabilitation services. In recent years he has commenced teaching across three universities.

Mr Irving praised the Southern Cross University students he supported.

“I’ve been in the industry for more than two decades, yet I gained new insights from the four Southern Cross students,” Mr Irving said.  “With the proficiency of graduates, the students did everything from assessing new ways for workers to do common tasks more safely, design programs to promote health and wellbeing and obtain a measure of the emotional wellness of the people.

“The investment by companies like Norco into initiatives like Occupational Therapy student placements delivers benefits not just to productivity, but the magic that good culture, morale, low injuries and staff happiness has on performance.

“The experience has made me prouder of the profession of Occupational Therapy, the quality of Southern Cross University students and the progressiveness of Norco, who welcomed the students as workers. I have encouraged the students to create a legacy, specifically a long-term placement relationship between Southern Cross and Norco.”

The students were thrilled with the placement opportunity at Norco.  

Lachlan Andrews: “These rural settings have provided us with a remarkable opportunity to observe and immerse ourselves in the unique cultures associated with agricultural practices, which differ greatly from clinical settings like hospitals.”

Jerome Tadros: “Through our experiences in these diverse rural environments, we have gained valuable insights that will help us tailor the information and ensure its relevance to the specific needs of individuals in agricultural communities.”

Norco Raleigh

This milk production site (bottling and packing) employs 170 workers in diverse roles such as production, quality control, logistics, and administration.

Traevis and Chloe were based here. They focussed on injury prevention. Specifically, they considered preventative proactive measures to avoid and prevent workplace injury and hazards. Importantly, much of this focussed on the cold room.

“Our primary responsibility was to conduct thorough task analyses, observations of the work processes, assessing potential risks associated with each worker's tasks, and review relevant literature to gain insights into the identified risks and explore effective preventive measures,” said Traevis.

Traevis and Chloe compiled the information and their findings into a comprehensive report on injury risk factors specifically related to the cold room environment.

“This detailed report was then prepared with the intention of providing Raleigh Norco with valuable insights and recommendations regarding potential risks and preventive measures associated with working in the cool room,” Chloe said.

Norco Lismore

The Lismore site is an agri-store, comprising a shop front and a small warehouse department.

Lachlan and Jerome focussed their efforts on a module for sleep hygiene. Specifically, they created an educational sleep hygiene module, comprising an information sheet and video, to promote healthy sleeping habits and improve overall wellbeing.

The Sleep Hygiene Seminar aims to raise awareness of the importance of sleep hygiene for overall wellbeing and job performance. Further presentations will be recommended and (likely) rolled out internally by Norco over time.

“The module is designed to be interactive and informative, providing practical strategies and tips for improving sleep hygiene. It is open to all employees, regardless of their shift patterns, and the topics covered include sleep architecture, sleep disorders, sleep debt, and circadian rhythms,” said Lachlan.

The seminar will also address common sleep hygiene practices such as establishing a regular sleep-wake schedule, creating a sleep-conducive environment, avoiding sleep disruptors such as caffeine, and managing stress and anxiety.

“We were thrilled to be involved in designing these seminars to enable Norco to create a culture of wellness that fosters the wellbeing of employees, improves job performance, and contributes to the overall success of the organisation,” said Jerome.

The Sleep Hygiene Seminar is the first of four planned sessions that will be run over an 18-month period to improve psychosocial wellness for workers, management, and organisational staff. The second seminar will focus on physical activity and manual handling, the third on diet and nutrition, and the last will summarise all the individual seminars and relate them back to improved psychosocial wellness for individuals and the workplace.