How To Improve Safety Awareness In The Workplace – Health and safety concerns are uppermost in the minds of many business leaders. There are many good reasons to create a safe workplace: you will protect yourself against legal problems, you will ensure greater productivity, and you’ll bolster morale throughout your workforce.
But unless you develop a culture where safety is taken seriously, you will never have a truly safe workplace. So, what are the best ways to make workers aware of their responsibilities, and vigilant against potential hazards?
Let’s take a look at a few strategies for safety.
Provide Personal Protective Equipment
Personal protective equipment can play a critical role in keeping workers safe. It’s therefore a good idea to not only provide that equipment, but to ensure that it’s worn by all workers at appropriate times.
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This kind of equipment comes in many forms. According to the industry and the type of jobs that workers carry out they might need from high-visibility jackets to hard-hats to facemasks. Think about which items are going to be most effective in your workplace.
Carry Out Workplace Induction
Having an onboarding process will help to let all new workers know what is expected of them right from day-one. This might involve a period in which experienced workers are shadowed by new ones, so that on-the-job instruction about everything, including safety, can be provided.
Re-Training Program
As well as providing training to new recruits, it is also worth providing regular refreshers to existing workers. Training will help to stave off complacency, and to keep everyone apprised of modern methods and how they’re evolving. This goes especially in high-risk industries like construction.
In some cases, you might determine that immediate training is required for everyone. For example, a risk assessment or a workplace accident might have revealed a vulnerability that can only be addressed through training.
Implementing Signage
If you are able to put signs up throughout the workplace, you will be able to remind workers of their responsibilities, and highlight particular areas of danger. In many cases, proper signage is a legal requirement. Remember that not everyone visiting your site will be as aware of the potential dangers as your workers might be.
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Posters might provide more generalized instructions to wear the right equipment. If the posters are well designed, and perhaps even slightly humorous, then the message might stand an even better chance of getting across. For example, you might have posters insisting that everyone wears personal protective equipment.
Regular Risk Assessment
Risk assessments, as we have already mentioned, should be an obligatory part of your workplace safety culture. They should be conducted at regular intervals, or in the wake of an accident. Inspections of the site should be incorporated into every assessment, and the findings should be logged. This will allow any problems to be troubleshooted later on. Risk assessments also help to remind everyone that health and safety is to be taken seriously.
