WCB Claims and Employee Loyalty: How to Fix Trust and Reduce the Costs of Workplace Injuries

Every day more companies complain that it’s hard to find good workers. That employee retention is decreasing or they’re dealing with issues like “quiet quitting.” In some cases, employees are taking leave of absences or filing Workers Comp (WCB) claims. It seems as though WCB claims and employee loyalty are at a conflict.

TL;DR: This article argues that loyalty and trust are fundamental to reducing WCB claim costs and improving outcomes. When employees don’t feel supported after an injury, loyalty drops, and claim costs rise due to longer recovery times, litigation, or disengagement. The piece emphasizes that loyalty must be earned by leadership through proactive support, consistent policies, and a culture that values workers during and after injury events.

People have stopped listening to each other and they’re becoming less patient with one another.

Recent studies have shown that throwing money at employees is not the solution. The shine of a raise wears off quickly. Especially if the raise is less than they expected.

Employees are asking for more.

I say this many times but having worked with companies from all industries and all sizes across Canada, I can’t help but notice patterns. From my position, I have the unique perspective that tells me what people actually think about the organization.

How a company manages their WCB claims can tell you a lot about their:

• Management style

• Communication style

• Where the problems are

• Where the solutions are

I’ve learned that companies that are considered “good” have 4 key things that companies that are “bad” don’t or struggle with.

What Employees Really Want (And Why It Affects WCB Claims)

At a time when leadership courses seem to be creeping up all the time, it amazes me that companies still struggle with leading their people. From giving their employees what they want.

You spend all these times coming up with goals, metrics, and results. You call them corporate score cards which means nothing to those near the bottom of the corporate ladder. It seems they’re just things to give middle management anxiety.

Think about it, the company sets out a set of expectations that are driven by numbers. If you hit your numbers, you may get a bonus, but at the very least you get to keep your job.

Don’t hit those numbers and your performance review goes down the toilet, your bonus suffers, and senior management is up your rectum.

What does this have to do with WCB claims?

I was talking to a health and safety manager the other day who told me, he’d rather give up his bonus then have to deal with the “bullshit” that comes with it.

He had grown used to a lifestyle his paycheck afforded, but what he needed to do to keep his job and get paid started to weigh on him. In turn the results trickled down to those below him on the corporate ladder. Not just in safety, but in operations as well.

He felt he didn’t have a choice. That he was being told what actions to enforce even if he disagreed. The company started to see an increase in messy WCB claims because of what could only be described by front line workers as rebellion. They were tired of being told what to do. They felt caged and restricted.

A few quit, but the majority stayed and claims started spiraling out of control and fast.

How Low Employee Loyalty Leads to Messy WCB Claims

There are certain characteristics of a “messy” WCB claim. If you were to guess what they were, I wonder what you would put on the list.

When I say a claim is messy, things you’ll notice are:

• Delays or difficulty in communication between the worker and employer

• Lack of participation in treatment or the return to work plan

• Delays in recovery

• Delayed reports of symptoms or injuries

• Their onsite behavior affects other co-workers / mindset

Notice that I have said nothing about the severity of the injury. That’s because that usually is not a factor.

This information I provided above is a list of symptoms of an employee that has no interest in a relationship with you. They’re looking out for their own interests. This behavior usually comes from an over aggressive management style that tells the employee what they “can” and “cannot do.”

A study around job satisfaction answered the question what people value from their company. What they found people wanted was autonomy. Which simply means to work in an environment where they can make their own choices.

Even if it’s a perception of choice the results were the same.

One of the first things I do when I start working with a company is set up a program and train staff to understand the system so they can explain the CHOICES employees have in the process.

We go over details where the company understand how a WCB claim affects their WCB premium and their company. Understanding these basics allows an organization to make decisions and present choices for a mutual result.

In turn, this creates loyalty on behalf of the worker. This is then witnessed by other employees who are more likely to work with the company and feel valued.

When you have loyalty from your staff, you see WCB claims that are shorter in duration. You have employees that work with you to decrease claims costs. You end up having employees that will work harder for you when they come back from injury because they felt cared for.

They become champions for the organization. What I mean is, they look out for the company’s interests and will hold their co-workers accountable for their actions.

For a broader look at how underreporting and mistrust drive up claim costs, this article might help

How Employee Loyalty Reduces WCB Claim Costs and Boosts Profit

WCB claims are an interruption to a worker’s life and to your business. Each party loses something, so it only makes sense to work together and minimize the losses for both sides.

This is where I think the company should go first. You have to consider WCB claims management as a profit generating department. This is because a company that has a solid return to work plan can improve their chances to bid work as well as retain key employees that will help in production.

It’s the company’s responsibility to create an environment where their people feel empowered to make decisions.

How to Empower Staff to Handle WCB Claims Effectively

One of the biggest mistakes I see companies make is they focus on the result vs. the behavior of their people. They focus on the number of lost time days, the amount of money being paid on a claim, and the statistics associated with a workers compensation claims.

I am not saying you shouldn’t pay attention to these, but what I am saying is you need to encourage certain behaviors and then use these metrics above to confirm if your people are doing the job properly.

Here’s how you empower your staff:

• Set the expectations you want (make it behavior based)

• Provide the support (this means the tools and resources to be able to do their job. )

• Get out of the WAY

• Evaluate their performance

• Accountability

When we dig deeper on each of these, it will paint a picture of what this would look like for you and your organization. I have worked companies with many different cultures. All of these points can be integrated into your existing culture or used to change your culture for the positive.

Setting the Expectations for a WCB claim

I already know I want to keep WCB claims costs low because that will reduce my WCB premiums. The way I do this is by making sure I have my team taking specific actions.

I want them to get the story from the worker. They need  to document the story properly on the tools and resources I’ve provided. When appropriate, gathering medical information that will help in the return to work plan and decision making process. Lastly, I want them offering accommodation if it’s required.

It’s that simple!

• Story

• Documentation

• Medical

• Accommodation

Provide Support

I have to make sure I have a program that guides the team in the event a WCB claim occurs. I want to make sure my team is properly trained to respond to a worker reporting symptoms. They should be treating each report as a WCB claim until the WCB authority for the company says it’s not.

You want to make sure they have the proper documents to complete and know what clinics, hospitals, or treatment centers there are in the area if needed. This level of planning mirrors the leadership-focused approach discussed here.

Something that often gets missed is who your team needs to speak with during the life of a claim. When to speak to someone and why. How are they supposed to get a hold of you and what should their expectations be of you.

Get out of the way!

If you’ve done the first two things properly then you can easily step away from the situation and know your team can make the right decisions whether you’re there or not. They’ll feel empowered to make the right decisions and take risks.

Some of my greatest lessons I ever learned was from risks I was able to take because I was given the room to do so.

Evaluate their Performance

If you want to make me angry, tell me that you want to reprimand someone for making a mistake or not doing their job, but then telling me that YOU didn’t set the expectation, provide the necessary support, or you micromanaged your team.

This is because as a leader the first three things are your job! If you tell me any of these are missing or you did a poor job in any of these I would hold YOU accountable first.

Now that’s out of the way, if you did do these things, now you can properly evaluate not only your team, but the program, and the injured worker. You can identify where things worked and didn’t work. (I try to avoid right and wrong because it sends a negative message.)

I believe we all have an opportunity to grow and learn which is why I like looking at what worked and didn’t work.

When I’m evaluating, what I am really checking is did they do what was expected. This is again behavior focused, but the numbers could tell me that certain behaviors were missed or incomplete which led to the result I’m seeing.

Accountability

Now that I’ve looked at everything I can find out if a goal was met or not. Assuming that things weren’t done in a way that worked, and I have identified the reason I can hold the problem to account.

This could be a team member that didn’t do what was expected. It could be a flaw in the WCB program that needs to be fixed. It could mean more training for my staff. Perhaps it was the worker that refused to properly participate in the return to work program.

OR

My personal favorite, the workers compensation board you were dealing with didn’t hold their end of the bargain. They made a bad decision, they didn’t support you or the worker, they delayed treatment, or delayed communication.

Whatever the case may be, when you can clearly tell your employees what is expected, provide the proper support, and get out of their way, you can improve you start to build the foundation of loyalty that can decrease the impact WCB claims have on you and your organization.

In cases where WCB decision-making is the root issue, you need to know how to push back the right way.

How Smart Companies Build Loyalty and Cut WCB Costs

If your WCB claims are a mess, it’s probably not just about paperwork — it’s about people. Loyal employees don’t file messy claims. They don’t dodge return-to-work plans. And they sure as hell don’t cost you six figures in premiums. They engage, they recover faster, and they stick around.

That kind of loyalty doesn’t come from pizza parties. It comes from training. Training that helps your team understand the process, give injured workers choices, and take action without waiting for permission.

That’s why I created a free guide:

How to Train Your Team to Respond to a WCB Incident

It gives you the blueprint to start building that loyalty through trust, clarity, and a damn good process.

Many employers benefit from external support in designing loyalty-based WCB programs.

If you’re looking for expert support building a program that actually works, working with a dedicated WCB consultant can make all the difference.

Contact me and let’s talk.