Improving health-promoting workplaces through interdisciplinary approaches. The example of WISEWORK-C, a cluster of five work and health projects within Horizon-Europe

Digitalization, green transitions, and demographic change are transforming societies and economies across Europe. These shifts are giving rise to new forms of work (eg, hybrid work, gig economy jobs) and reshaping management and work organization practices (eg, through algorithmic decision-making or digital monitoring of worker performance). While such developments offer important opportunities to improve sustainability, flexibility, and efficiency, they also present challenges for ensuring healthy and equitable working conditions—especially if workplace policies and practices do not keep pace with these transformations (1). Work-related illnesses and injuries already place a substantial burden on employers and the broader economy, with costs estimated to exceed 3.3% of the European Union (EU) gross domestic product annually (2). It is well established that the work environment plays a crucial role in shaping both physical and mental health. Poorly designed or managed workplaces are associated with increased risks of musculoskeletal disorders (MSD), stress, burnout, and long-term sickness absence (3). In contrast, supportive work environments—characterized by ergonomic design, good environmental quality, and worker autonomy—have been shown to improve well-being, productivity, and job satisfaction (4). Rapid advances in digital technologies, particularly artificial intelligence (AI), further amplify both opportunities and risks in the modern workplace. AI can help enhance safety, reduce physical demands, and streamline tasks, but also raises concerns about autonomy, fairness, transparency, and mental well-being (5). Understanding how these technologies reshape power dynamics, management practices, and psychosocial work environments is essential to ensuring responsible, inclusive, and health-promoting digital transitions. Amid these transitions (6), MSD continue to be among the most common work-related health issues (7), while stress, depression, and anxiety are frequently cited by workers and managers as critical mental health concerns (8). The emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated these changes, introducing additional mental health challenges and intensifying pre-existing physical risk factors (9). For instance, the increase in computer use, shift to non-traditional workspaces (eg, home offices), and reduced physical activity among office workers often result in prolonged static postures and repetitive movements, factors that elevate the risk of negative health outcomes (10). These post-pandemic trends are also linked to a rise in mental health issues such as stress, burnout, and social isolation (11). In response to these challenges, the EU has launched several strategic initiatives aimed at ensuring safe, healthy, and inclusive working conditions. The EU Strategic Framework on Health and Safety at Work 2021–2027 calls for adapting occupational safety and health (OSH) practices to the realities of digitalization, demographic shifts, and new forms of work (12). Complementing this, the European Commission’s 2023 Communication on a comprehensive approach to mental health (13) sets mental health on equal footing with physical health, announcing 20 flagship actions backed by over €1.2 billion in funding. Among these are initiatives that specifically target psychosocial risks at work, including the development of an EU-level initiative on managing psychosocial risks (14) and the organization of EU-wide workplace campaigns to raise awareness and promote preventive action (15). These efforts align with the European Pillar of Social Rights (16), reinforcing the EU’s commitment to fair working conditions, universal access to healthcare, and robust social protections. In this context, WISEWORK-C (Workplace Innovation for Sustainable Well-being Cluster) (www.wisework-c.eu) is a recently established cluster composed of five independent projects funded by the EU Framework Programme for Research and Innovation Horizon Europe under the call “HORIZON-HLTH-2023-ENVHLTH-02-02: Evidence-based interventions for the promotion of mental and physical health in changing working environments (post-pandemic workplaces)”. The cluster’s primary aim is to enhance collaboration and jointly promote the benefits of addressing mental and physical health in the workplace and develop and evaluate a range of evidence-based interventions. Using scientific findings, the cluster seeks to inform and influence policy and decision-makers to take greater action, ultimately leading to more sustainable, health-promoting workplaces. To achieve these goals, WISEWORK-C brings together five Horizon Europe projects (see table 1) with unique interdisciplinary approaches: (i) EU-CoWork. EU-CoWork’s ambition is to develop an evidence basis for and subsequently develop, test and evaluate tailored `compassionate workplace programs` (17) in Europe to leverage the positive impacts and existing assets of workplaces and mitigate the negative impacts and challenges of the new ways of working for the mental and physical health and well-being of employees faced with end-of-life experiences (such as loss, grief, dying, death, serious illness and care giving) and their colleagues (18). The project is a collaboration between five countries (Austria, Belgium, Greece, the UK, and Sweden) and entails a cross-national mixed-methods intervention study with an embedded process and impact evaluation. It applies an international co-creative and developmental evaluation of tailored compassionate workplace programs, and mixed-methods process and impact evaluation combining a timed series of quantitative cross-sectional panel surveys, qualitative interviews and fieldwork, and policy document analysis. Tailored compassionate workplace programs will be developed in 12 digitalized and/or green workplaces across four European countries. (ii) INTERCAMBIO. There has been insufficient attention to the impacts of climate change and the green transition on occupational health and safety (19). The INTERCAMBIO project aims to promote the health of workers in work environments impacted by climate change, implementation of new sustainable work practices, and the green transition (20). The project is a collaboration between 14 partners in eight countries (Belgium, Denmark, The Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the UK). INTERCAMBIO addresses mental and physical health of workers through specific workplace interventions in five relevant industries including outdoor construction, healthcare, public transit, wind turbine manufacturing, and waste management/recycling using mixed-methods. In addition, INTERCAMBIO is also performing observational research to evaluate both short- and long-term impacts of occupational heat, cold, and solar UV radiation exposures in relation to mental and physical health effects, including in biomarker-based studies, as well as in large-scale cohort studies using innovative exposure assessment approaches. INTERCAMBIO is coordinating a diverse stakeholder community and developing a new health research agenda in interaction with other (European) initiations. INTERCAMBIO seeks to contribute to supporting decent green jobs. (iii) PROSPERH. The PROSPERH (Promoting Positive Mental and Physical Health at Work in a Changing Environment) research project underscores the urgency of prioritizing holistic workplace well-being. With the evolving nature of work—marked by remote and hybrid arrangements, technological advancements, and increasing job demands—it is imperative to integrate strategies that enhance both mental and physical health in professional settings. PROSPERH enhances workplace health by providing evidence-based digital interventions, targeted at the individual, peer and organizational levels, that help prevent and manage work-related physical and mental health conditions and prepare workplaces for evolving environments. Employers will benefit from improved health promotion strategies, while policy-makers will gain valuable insights for shaping effective interventions that foster healthier behaviors and workspaces. The PROSPERH intervention is being delivered via the PROSPERH portal and application in 11 countries (Albania, Australia, Denmark, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Kosovo, The Netherlands, Portugal, Spain and Turkey), targeting the construction and healthcare sectors and workers in telework and ICT-based mobile work settings. (iv) SONATA. The SONATA project aims to augment currently existing and develop novel architectural adaptation technologies, including smart building systems that optimize indoor environmental quality and comfort (21) and robotically moveable acoustic walls and ceiling panels that reconfigure space (22). The project is assessing the medical, situational, and social impacts of these technologies across three shared workplace contexts: an open-plan office, a hybrid co-working space, and a set of home offices, in four different countries: Belgium, Germany, Italy, and The Netherlands. Accordingly, it will also establish a set of empirically grounded recommendations on how to (a) measure, compare, and optimize the health and well-being benefits of architectural adaptation technologies; (b) establish the ‘orchestration’ of multiple adaptive technologies in order to augment their joint benefit; and (c) prescribe the equitable distribution of these benefits among co-workers that share the same office. Ultimately, the SONATA research envisions a shared office workplace that is able to adapt to the ever-changing needs and preferences of individual workers, instead of expecting that these