As an ergonomist, I've had the privilege of exploring a wide array of work environments, each with its own unique challenges and opportunities. Even though most of my work focused around office ergonomics, some of my most memorable days were in the industrial sector, from bustling assembly lines at a vitamin company to race car manufacturing floors and even a major theme park.
Despite these big differences in setting, the work at its core was the same - spotting and reducing risk in any and all types of work environments and tasks. No matter if someone was bolting in parts for an engine, attaching labels to vitamin bottles, pipetting large amounts of samples at once under a fume hood, or even operating a roller coaster, we ergonomists are there to observe the body at work, and look out for any potential short or long-term risk of harm.
While the diversity of postures and applications can vary greatly, ergonomists are still able to use standard ergonomic principles to assess the risk and then ultimately do what many of us find most rewarding: come up with creative solutions to mitigate and reduce these issues. Observing the dynamic human body at work can be fascinating and even fun onsite, but it can also take time. If I was lucky, I’d have a team or at least another colleague with me to collect this data - but often times I’d be on my own, tasked with gathering large amounts of observational data and also trusting my ergonomic intuition to know how long to observe for each task while making sure I got to all the other tasks on my list.
The road ahead would be a long one - organizing all my videos and notes, taking screenshots of notable postures - in order to run industry-standard assessments like REBA, RULA, Revised NIOSH Lifting Equation, and more. This was often done after leaving the excitement of the initial hustle and bustle behind onsite, and we’d often log long hours filling in worksheets, crunching numbers, cross-referencing the tables and multipliers – and of course, whipping out the good ol’ calculator for assessments.
Some automated worksheet calculators do exist, but it was still up to me to painstakingly find specific postures and joint angles while gauging the context of time, duration, and repetition - and then repeating the same process for each different task. Sometimes it might feel like I already intuitively knew a posture or task could be dangerous, but written and calculated proof was still needed to properly document this risk. Along with compiling all the data and findings into a presentable report with manually added images, painstakingly-added color-coded drawn angles and equational math, this whole process can get pretty arduous.
When I first found out about TuMeke, I knew their computer vision software could be a game-changer. For practitioners who know all too well the long-winded process of collecting, analyzing, and managing data for job hazard assessments, the software truly has the potential to provide much-needed relief by making everything much more streamlined.
This wasn’t the first time computer vision has been used in ergonomics, but it certainly is the first time I’ve ever seen it run so smoothly and processed so quickly in near real-time. My biggest initial concern was over the accuracy of the tracking of the body and moving joints in 3D space, but the algorithm notices and picks up body and joint movements remarkably well - without wearables and trackers.
The nifty color-coded skeleton overlay almost felt like having “ergonomics goggles” and analyzing body movements from an ergonomist’s point of view. It visually reflected how I would personally observe a task for risk, quickly noting problem movements and angles. On top of that, I found that the software had the ability to parse all this visual data into industry-standard outputs - our trusty REBA/RULA/NIOSH worksheets (along with Revised Strain Index and Snook Tables) were automatically filled out and compiled in a custom, presentable report in a way that felt like I had a secret “do my homework for me” button - what a gift it would have been back in the day!
These days, I’m hanging up my ergo practitioner hat for now and instead moving into the Customer Success space with TuMeke, helping clients from a training and consulting standpoint to best utilize their software for their goals. Even though I’m not going to be directly on the floor in an ergonomist role, I’m looking forward to being a part of the process through our users and continuing to bring TuMeke into the safety world and beyond.
TuMeke has already established a strong foundation for efficiently promoting safety and well-being in working environments, and I'm excited to see our team roll out even more features, updates, and performance improvements. While it’ll be a bit of a transition to cross over from the practitioner side to a more high-level consulting and support role, I’m excited to still be able to have a hand in a variety of use applications and environments - reminiscent of my past experiences in dynamic industrial assignments.
As I step into this new role, I aim to leverage my ergonomics expertise to help create more robust safety programs and initiatives for our users. Additionally, I see it as a rewarding challenge to gather honest user feedback to continuously improve our product and to explore the various ways TuMeke can be integrated into larger, more comprehensive safety protocols and programs. I'm also looking forward to learning and growing in this role by observing how different companies, both big and small, tackle their issues and challenges head-on, driving positive change toward a safer future. I can't wait to celebrate wins and milestones with our customers, acting as a cheerleader for their ideas, creative solutions, and implementations!
Jenny Zhao
%201.svg){kind=logo}
.jpg)
