Annie Barnwell is truly a jack of all trades. There’s hardly an industry she hasn’t touched during her career as an ergonomist. From automotive production to poultry, law courts to injection molding, emergency services to recreation, Annie’s done it all.
But no matter the job, Annie always has her eye on the same thing: interactions between users and their equipment. The variables she looks at stay the same; the difference is how they’re applied.
“The real cool thing is that my role is the same everywhere,” she says.
“The biggest difference is language and terminology. No matter what the industry is, I’m still looking at people and what they’re interacting with.”
Annie thrives on the challenge of figuring a job out and breaking down its components. It’s her attention to detail that allows her to shine in her role. She likes to know absolutely everything about someone’s role so she can fully grasp the larger picture.
And there’s a lot more to that than simply observing a task. Annie comes into every job armed with questions; she needs to know if the work is repetitive, what equipment is available, how often someone works, how long they’ve been in that role, their break schedule, psychological stressors, even what they do outside of work that might compound the strains certain tasks put on the body… the list goes on.
Sometimes, if Annie can improve someone’s posture, they’re automatically able to lift or handle more. But, it’s not always that simple.
“You never know what will become relevant during an assessment and help you get to the root cause of the problem. Once you figure out how to solve that root cause, everything will fall into place,” she says.
And a lot of the time it’s a pretty fun job. The last year alone has seen Annie out on sail boats, doing ceramic work to test forces, looking at strains on sound technicians, and doing assessments on cheese makers, welders, and metallurgical lab workers.
To top it all off, Annie brings her expertise into the classroom teaching course in Occupational Health and Safety at the University of Calgary. So whatever your problem, Annie’s got a solution.
EWI Works offers many services that can improve your quality of life. Find out more about our Online Training, Services, and Resources.
Follow us on Twitter for more updates and offers, or sign up for our newsletter below.
- February 25, 2020
- Category: EWI News
- Author: Mohammadreza Mirhadi