The application of salutogenesis to organisations

Abstract

In highly organised societies, understanding how organisations influence employees’ health, customers’ health and population health is crucial for health promotion. As the immediate influence on employee health is particularly strong, the chapter focuses on this aspect. Based on a review of ongoing changes of the economy, of organising work and of the roles of employees, we argue that agency for organisational health lies and needs to be strengthened within the organisation. Consequently, we define Organisational Health Development (OHD) as both the ongoing reproduction and the targeted improvement of health in organisations as social systems, based on the interaction (process dimensions) of individual and organisational capacities (structural dimensions).
We review conceptual and empirical research of OHD as well as of health-oriented interventions in organisations that at least partly follow the salutogenic orientation. This review leads to an OHD model that shows how individual and organisational capacities co-produce both pathogenic and salutogenic processes in organisations, which taken together influence the sustainable performance of organisations. Such a framework allows to specify the general salutogenic model for the context of organisations. It serves as a joint group action theory for all stakeholders, generating a common language, compatible perspectives and mutual action to improve OHD. Additionally, it supports for well-structured, comparable intervention research on capacity building for OHD. The main challenge for the future will be to hold organisations accountable to be a healthy organisation—being low in producing pathogenic processes, but high in producing salutogenic processes for its members, customers and the larger environment.