Keep in the know on OSHA: reward employees who follow safety incentives as a way to promote safety in the workplace.
Published in: Alaska Business Monthly
Date: 4/1/2006
By: Myers, Deborah J
Since the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970, OSHA has been the organization overseeing America’s workplaces to ensure their safety for employees. Naturally, many work environments are by their nature hazardous, but in most cases, reasonable precautions make them as safe as possible. It’s the job of OSHA administrators to enforce safety regulations. It’s your job as an employer to comply with OSHA standards.
Although compliance may seem an overwhelming task at times, with a few simple steps, any company can be on its way to a safer workplace. Whether you need to crack down on safety procedures that have gone lax, or you are starting a new business, OSHA regulations are in place for your–and your employees’–benefit.
EDUCATE yourself on what OSHA requires for your industry. Ira Doty, operations manager for AGC Safety Inc., advises employers to frequently visit OSHA’s official Web site, www.osha.gov, to keep up-to-date on ever-changing OSHA regulations.
That’s where Doty read about new fall protection standards, which include orthostatic intolerance. For example, if a window washer using a harness were to fall from the scaffold, that employee could suffer suspended trauma from the harness cutting off his circulation if help does not come right away.
Orthostatic intolerance also can involve employment such as security guards who stand in one place a prolonged period of time or receptionists who sit for hours at a time. Allowing and encouraging employees to take sufficient breaks to change position can help you avoid these pitfalls.
OSHA also reports on their top violations, which may help you avoid the most common ones. For example, scaffolding requirements (standard 1926.451) were most common in 2005 with 8,891 reported instances, followed by 7,267 hazard communication violations (standard 1910.1200), 6,122 fall protection violations (standard 1926.501), and 4,278 respiratory protection violations (standard 1910.34).
Industry-specific trade publications, seminars and Web sites also can shed light on areas where your company needs to improve its safety. Sign up for OSHA seminars, workshops and newsletters for tips on how to implement OSHA requirements at your workplace and for leads on resources to help you improve your company’s safety.
Read the safety section of manuals that come with equipment that your employees use. You may be ignoring safety features or hazards that could lead to injury or illness. Make sure that the companies manufacturing your equipment have your contact information in case they issue a safety recall.
OBSERVE the workplace in action while employees are going about their jobs on a normal workday without their realizing that you are observing for unsafe situations. Otherwise, they may work more safely for your benefit.
Don’t focus on necessarily what they are doing, but more upon how they are doing it. Naturally, working with electricity is hazardous; however, if a trained employee is working with adequate safety gear and is handling the wiring properly, there should be little reason for alarm. But make a note if the employee’s training is out-of-date, the safety gloves are off or if he ignores safety procedures. This kind of a lapse can indicate a widespread problem throughout your company, or just an individual’s problem. Watch enough employees working that you can tell how bad the safety problem is.
RECORD what conflicts you have observed between what happens in your workplace and what OSHA expects from you. Documentation will help you prove to OSHA inspectors that you care about safety and are working to improve it. Date when you made your observations and write down specifically what you saw.
DISCUSS with your employees’ direct supervisors what you can do to remedy these situations. You may be surprised at the safety concerns you have missed. Talking with management also may help you uncover hidden talent within your organization. Larry Bethel, general manager at Environmental Management Inc. in Anchorage, recommends having a dedicated safety and health coordinator who can oversee training, compliance and documentation. By talking with management about safety, you could find someone to promote within to the position of safety coordinator.
It may be tempting to heap these duties upon a current employee, but doing so would likely compromise the safety program you are trying to build.
“Oftentimes, you end up having a person who is responsible for a multitude of other jobs and health and safety gets pushed to the back burner,” Bethel said.
Ed Foster, director of operations for the University of Alaska Fairbanks, also recommends a dedicated safety officer to keep companies “up-to-date on the requirements. They can go to an OSHA-compliance conference once a year to go over changes and new requirements.”
Talking with direct supervisors will likely also yield great ideas for improving safety. Perhaps your employees need more training. Mentoring from an experience employee or certification of some kind may meet these needs. Providing safety gear, such as protective eyewear, wrist rests, or back belts can underscore safety to your employees. Sometimes, improving the work area is necessary to keep them safe. Warning signs, brighter lighting or non-skid stair treads are examples of workplace improvement.
These expenses may seem superfluous, but compared with the liability of an unsafe work environment, they are reasonable.
IMPLEMENT the changes that need to be made to your workplace and document those changes. This will help prove that you care about employees’ safety and are doing your best as an employer to provide a safe work environment. Any training should also be documented and filed with the employees’ personnel records.
REINFORCE safety as part of your company culture. Posters, banners and newsletters can share safety messages such as the importance of using hearing protection if yours is a noisy environment or how to adjust an office chair to be ergonomically correct.
“Communicating with employees is the biggest areas employers can improve when it comes to safety,” said Bob Miller, safety officer for Facilities and Services at the University of Alaska Fairbanks.
Between the employer, who often wants to comply to save money on fees, and the employee, who generally views compliance as a hamper to productivity, “communication helps them meet in the middle,” Miller said. “Each should understand the point of view of the other.”
Dory recommends implementing what he calls “safety tipping,” or, making comments about safety “every time supervisors and managers make contact with the employee.”
Provide clean, attractive safety gear and urge employees to use it. For new employees, demonstrate how to use it as part of orientation training and write it into your employee manual. For existing employees, host a meeting and show them how and why this equipment should be used.
Consistently discipline employees who refuse to use safety gear if its use is required by law. Again, documenting the verbal or written warning will help you prove that you as an employer did all you could to ensure that safety gear was available but the employee refused to use it. Follow through with termination if the employee repeatedly refuses to use safety gear.
Although this may seem a drastic step, if you lay out the expectations clearly, you should not have to terminate employment over neglecting safety.
Reward employees for their efforts with safety incentives.
“You need to know what motivates employees,” Foster said. “Use those as incentives to build on your safety program.”
For example, a construction crew may be more motivated by a pizza party than would an office staff who frequently orders pizza. The desk-bound would likely prefer a masseuse to treat them to 10-minute chair massages.
Make the “rules” of your incentive program clear, such as 90 accident-free days equals a free pizza party for the whole crew, or a masseuse will visit after everyone completes a safety seminar.
AUDIT your workplace’s safety by hiring an outside consultant to audit your firm annually. By using someone who is not familiar with your workplace and who is up-to-date on OSHA regulations, you have a much better chance of catching all the safety hang-ups at your facility. Help your employees view a safety consultant as your partner in keeping them safe, not as someone who is there to criticize how they work. OSHA has a consulting branch that does just this. (Relax: If you don’t comply in any area, you won’t be reported.)
INSPECT for safety weekly or monthly for safety lapses, remedy the situation, and document the inspection and the remedy. This may seem cumbersome, but an inspection form or checklist can streamline the process. You could also delegate the inspection to other managers so that a fresh pair of eyes is looking for safety problems and so that employees won’t know who will be looking for safety infractions.
It’s impossible to eliminate all hazards from the workplace. Accidents cannot be completely avoided; however, taking a few steps to ensure your employees’ overall safety can protect them and keep your company in compliance with OSHA.
COPYRIGHT 2006 Alaska Business Publishing Company, Inc.