ErgoWork 2022: “From an ergonomics research standpoint, Romania stands at the highest level in Europe and the

ErgoWork 2022: “From an ergonomics research standpoint, Romania stands at the highest level in Europe and the

The Faculty of Management in Production and Transportation within Politehnica University Timisoara hosted during June 16-17, 2022, the ErgoWork 2022 International Conference – ergonomics and workplace management, an event meant to encourage sharing developments and interdisciplinary accomplishments in the field of ergonomics and workplace management.

The conference was organized in a hybrid system, with guests from the country and abroad, and is at its second edition, the first being held exclusively online due to the pandemic. The main topic of the conference was actually about the changes brought by the pandemic to workplace management.

According to the initiator of the conference, Prof. Dr. Eng. Anca Drăghici, Ph.D., a professor at Politehnica University Timisoara and president of ErgoWork Society, the research for the last doctorate thesis in the field of ergonomics and workplace management defended at the UPT Faculty of Management in Production and Transport was carried out exclusively in two companies from Timisoara and the results were also interpreted from a medical standpoint. Furthermore, the research collective from the faculty focuses on improving workplace comfort, be it an industrial workplace or an office space.

The main challenge today globally in the field of workplace management is not the lack of technical solutions, because engineers are resourceful and find solutions, but the financial resources allocated to workplace management. Updating a workplace and aligning it to the current context takes serious investments and a change of mentality. The old concept needs to be replaced with a new one, we need to adapt to the new normal and learn to work in different spaces, event from outside or home, there are a number of successful experiments in this field, and an online infrastructure needs to be implemented, similar to the Virtual Campus from Politehnica University Timisoara.

In the coming times, a number of challenges lie with the companies, where talent retention will require that companies create extraordinary, collaborative experiences. People will no longer show to work if they are not offered new experiences, a comfortable and creative environment that facilitates innovation.

These are a few of the conclusions of the conference and the ergonomics society from countries from Central and Eastern Europe, represented at the event, have an important say in the field.

The conference was organized by Politehnica University Timisoara and the Romanian Ergonomics Society in collaboration with Politehnica University Timisoara, GreenForest, Cluj-Napoca Technical University, The National Institute for Research and Development in Environment Protection, Ergonomics and Human Factors Regional Educational CEEPUS Network, Erasmus+, alongside partner ergonomics societies from Hungary, Bulgaria, Serbia and Slovenia. There were even more online attendees, many ergonomics and workplace management researchers from Malaysia, China, Pakistan, Europe and America joining the event.

As it was stated by the international partners present at the event, from an ergonomics and workplace management research standpoint, Romania stands at the highest level in Europe and the world.