I was recently with the British Safety Council and we ended up on the topic of company policies.
They had a feature in their magazine about drugs and alcohol at work and how it costs British business billions of pounds every year. How drugs and alcohol contribute to 26% of workplace accidents costing over £4bn per year. How it impairs performance and productivity, as well as affecting the safety of others.
Many companies have policies to deal with these topics, but the biggest stumbling block is distributing, understanding and getting acceptance from employees. Through my help in implementing Your Safety PAL in businesses, I hear time and time again about the difficulties in making sure that employees know and understand the different policies companies have in place.
Many employees when they first start, go through an induction process. The process itself can be very intense with many new skills to learn and remember, plus then the learning of company policies which are also part of the process. But what happens 6 months, 1 year or 2 years down the line? Or even when new versions or amendments are added? How can we ensure, as responsible business owners, that our hard work in keeping people safe and remaining compliant doesn’t fall on deaf ears?
To solve the distribution and implementation problem we have to think the problem through logically and place simple effective steps in place.
1 Legal Position
We need to know our legal position so we can protect our staff, visitors, sub-contractors and ultimately ourselves, as responsible owners. It’s no good distributing a document which is poor quality, does not cover you legally or is impossible to understand. We need to make sure it is comprehensive, devoid of grey areas and states clearly what is and is not expected.
2 Communication is key
We need to make the communication channels between management and employees wide and open in both directions. We need the employees to tell us that they have read and understood the policy, but not only that, if they haven’t understood the policy that they can ask for help or training. We need to build a culture that does not stigmatise employees for asking for help, or a culture of apathy where they think nobody cares anyway.
3 Training
We need to make sure those responsible for the policy are trained in implementing it and can spot problems before they grow to form bad habits or create accidents. These are also the people who can give help and advice either directly face to face, or in larger organisations, or where shifts are concerned, through electronic channels.
4 Testing
Testing employees regular that they understand and implement the policy is a must to complete the success loop. Saying you have read a document and understood a document are two completely different things. Testing to make sure the employee has understood the document is good practice and helps you in fulfilling your legal obligations as a business owner. Also by knowing what they need help on, you can plan and implement that help which not only keeps them safe but also their work colleges and yourself. Planning to improve peoples knowledge of processes and policies can make a real difference to the bottom line.
5 Audit
Make sure everything is written down, documented and stored securely. If the worse does happen despite all your best efforts, producing evidence of your hard work is essential. Make sure you have records for each employee, what they have and haven’t done and kept them up to date.
All this best practice has been used in the building of Your Safety PAL. It allows you to implement this style of thinking and working, quickly and easily, whilst offering greater protection to your employees and yourself. If it sounds of interest to yourself, then look at our pricing options here.
Once you have an account it only takes a few minutes to upload and distribute company policies, plus the system does so much, much more to protect you.
Updated policy information can be found here
https://yoursafetypal.com/2018/01/24/drug-alcohol-dismissal-can-costly/
Other interesting articles to increase knowledge and awareness can be found here:
https://yoursafetypal.com/2018/02/12/contractor-management-responsibility/
https://yoursafetypal.com/2018/02/07/cant-prove-it/
We are always happy to receive feedback on any of our articles, so please get in touch.
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