Is the goal of your day to day business to keep your workers compensation costs low, if not at zero?? If it’s not currently your goal, it should be.
But how do you accomplish this?
The solution is quite simple, actually. It all starts with your company setting the scene for safety. Safety must always be viewed as an INCENTIVE and not as an expense. So the first step is to create your company safety manual – and I don’t mean just photocopying the OSHA regulations manual! This safety manual is an actual thought-out policy and procedure manual on how you plan on conducting every day tasks as safe as possible. Once you write the manual, there will be updates if an easier and safer method is figured out.
So you have your safety manual. What’s the next step? Management buy-in. This is probably the most important part of the process. Why would your employees work safely when management is ignoring all of the safety rules? You have to train your management staff to “walk the talk” on a daily basis. It is important for the workers who are actually doing the day to day tasks that their bosses believe in having a safe jobsite.
How do you know if you have a safe jobsite? Many times, your management – whether it is upper management in the corporate office down to the superintendents and foremen on the job – aren’t aware of what a safe jobsite consists of. So the next step is to conduct training.
OSHA has updated many requirements over the past year mandating specific training to be completed by employers. That’s right – MANDATING. If the training isn’t completed, an OSHA Compliance officer can issue a violation which may result in a fine. A lot of times, the fine will be more money than the training would have originally cost. But, again, instead of seeing training as an investment for their workers, it is seen as an expense.
What will happen though if you put all these steps together and create a strong safety program for your company? You have lower turnover rates because you have employees who feel like they are a part of a company that cares about them, lower injury rates because you are training people in how to do their job safely, and a company with a low worker’s comp rate and a small number of OSHA visits, if any. When both of these numbers are low, your company can bid and be awarded more work and become more profitable than they are now.
So why wouldn’t you want to create a strong safety culture within your company?
Dollars spend in promoting safety can truly pay for themselves.