Workplace safety. A tough nut to crack.
Today, formulating policies and adhering to them isn’t enough. You need a holistic approach that prioritizes worker well-being as well as the longevity of the business.
That’s where the concept of building a sustainable health and safety culture comes in.
It refers to cultivating a shared mindset towards safety and individual responsibility within an organization. That means empowering your employees to openly express safety concerns, enhancing hazard identification and mitigation, securing leadership commitment, and so on.
In this blog, we’ll dive into the top aspects of building a foolproof workplace safety culture. So that your business is fueled by safe, responsible, and productive employees.
Leadership Commitment to Safety
“Practice what you preach.”
Exactly what business owners need to do to cultivate a culture of workplace safety.
Begin by fully committing to the goal of bringing about a revolution in how you handle risks and employee well-being. Create health and safety management teams, establish clear goals, set timelines, and get the ball rolling.
You must model desired behavior to demonstrate your belief that workplace safety is non-negotiable. For example, wearing personal protective equipment (PPE) when conducting surveys shows your regard for the safety protocols.
In addition, it’s essential to engage employees as well as top management to streamline occupational health management. Be consistent with your effort, hold yourself accountable for worker well-being, and take an interest in worksites personally.
Employee Engagement & Empowerment
Your employees form the core of your business. And to keep them safe, you must empower them to have agency.
Start with engaging employees in safety committees to foster a sense of ownership within them. For example, holding ground zero discussions to understand the current situation and what occupational health standards should be implemented.
This allows you to create regulations that do not hinder the work of your employees. Make sure all your employees are heard and that they aren’t hesitant to voice out their problems in the first place.
To motivate them, you can plan engaging safety-related activities like an award function to reward highly responsible employees. As a result, more people will be inspired to work safely and consciously. But don’t overdo it, lest employees start hiding incidents to gain incentives.
Peer-to-peer recognition programs are a great way to boost employee morale while promoting respect and appreciation between colleagues.
Shift from Reactive to Proactive Prevention
Waiting for an incident to occur so that you can make your move is a recipe for disaster. Businesses need to be smart about how they flag and mitigate risks.
It’s best to install occupational health software in your workplace. That way, you can run quick worksite hazard analyses and deploy the best risk management strategies in time.
Plus, employees can quickly access important safety documents to report an incident and rightly deal with the aftermath.
And that’s not even the tip of the iceberg. Because you can also conduct regular health and safety audits, track safety performance metrics, and ensure compliance with regulatory standards like ISO 45001:2018 with such a technology.
Communication & Collaboration
Business owners must understand that there’s a difference between being open to communication and motivating their employees to communicate openly.
The former emphasizes your mindset. The latter is the way you implement safety communication channels.
Establishing anonymous reporting systems provides a neutral ground for the worker to report unsafe behavior without fearing reprisal. Similarly, suggestion boxes assist employees in conveying much-needed improvements on site.
But what seals the deal is an open-door policy at all levels within an organization. That means an employee can approach their team lead anytime during working hours. By the same token, the team lead can communicate with the manager or the department head.
However, it’s not just about being available to your employees, but actively listening to them. That’s the only way to achieve productive two-way communication for safety culture development.
At the same time, it’s important to ensure that all departments can communicate and collaborate seamlessly for effective health and safety management.
Employee Training
Training employees regarding their safety means reducing the number of workplace accidents. Software for health and safety management can assist you in conducting safety culture assessments and planning safety awareness campaigns accordingly.
This way you can identify the current training needs to educate workers about the best workplace safety practices. In fact, you can utilize a variety of training methods to present information more engagingly and memorably.
Furthermore, safety officers can tailor these programs to different groups of employees—workers, supervisors, project managers, etc.
To top it off, occupational health software also allows you to assess the effectiveness of the training, evaluate different employees, and promote active participation.
As a result, you can reduce workplace accidents and injuries with the help of a health safety management system.
Evidence-based Decision Making
Decisions powered by real-time data can contribute significantly to enhancing an organization’s safety culture and overall growth.
Such a strategy reinforces the ideology of proactive workplace safety by providing employees with live data and quick analytics.
For example, occupational health and safety management system (OHSMS) software helps you monitor key performance indicators (KPIs), identify potential threats, and implement strategies for workplace injury prevention, etc.
You can also collaborate effortlessly and ensure transparency across the entire organization using OHSMS software.
Bottom Line
Building an organizational safety culture is daunting. It takes time, patience, and effort to gradually see the results.
To start on the right foot, commit fully to your goal. Don’t focus on just providing a safe environment for your employees, but optimizing every procedure, communication, and personnel for health and safety management.
For starters, engage your employees in emergency preparedness planning and conduct regular safety training programs to upskill them.
Make the much-needed shift from reactive to proactive risk management through quality OHSMS software and see the difference as your organization becomes a safer and healthier workplace.