INTRODUCTION P olicies and research in occupational health and safety (OHS) and the working environ- ment have had – and still have – a focus on large enterprises. There are many reasons for this, not least of which are that they still employ a high proportion of employees and have the resources to influence, interact and contribute to develop- ment and research. As a result research on which legislation is built – if it indeed is – is mostly based on research in large enterprises since small and medium enterprises (SMEs) do not have the 139 Copyright © eContent Management Pty Ltd. Small Enterprise Research (2014) 21: 139–147. Guest Editorial: Special Issue – Understanding small enterprises: Healthy lives in healthy businesses C reating healthy work in small enterprises – from understanding to action: Summary of current knowledge STEPHEN LEGG Centre for Ergonomics, Occupational Safety and Health, Massey University, New Zealand I AN LAIRD Centre for Ergonomics, Occupational Safety and Health, Massey University, New Zealand K IRSTEN OLSEN Centre for Ergonomics, Occupational Safety and Health, Massey University, New Zealand PETER HASLE Centre for Industrial Production, Aalborg University, Denmark ABSTRACT Although much is known about small and medium enterprises (SMEs), our current knowledge and understanding of occupational health and safety (OHS) and the work environment in SMEs is limited. Far less is known about how SMEs put our knowledge of OSH into action. In short, how do we create healthy work and healthy lives as well as ‘healthy business’ in SMEs? The present paper, which also acts as an Editorial for this special issue, addresses these questions by providing a summary of current knowledge – our understanding – about how to create healthy work and healthy lives for workers and owner-managers in SMEs whilst concurrently also aiming to create a healthy business (in terms of profitability and sustainability). This paper and the special issue also emphasise the need to convert this knowledge into action – ‘from understanding to action’. Keywords: small and medium enterprise (SMEs), small business, health and safety, work environment Volume 21, Issue 2, 2014 SMALL ENTERPRISE RESEARCH Downloaded by [Massey University Library] at 18:50 03 February 2015