A girl has to work if she wants nice things, OK, afford to live in the current climate!
Alongside my work as a social media manager, I also do agency work. I enjoy it. I love the fact that every day can be different in my life, and I feel very fortunate that I am able to live that way rather than the 9-5.
However with each job, is another set of health and safety rules. It's understandable. There’s nothing worse that can happen to your business than having employees injured in the workplace - especially if it’s a result of your own negligence.
Businesses need to make sure that the workplace they've provided is perfectly safe, and the risk of employees becoming injured or getting sick is kept at a minimum. As the owner of your business, there are a number of things you should be doing to ensure this, no matter the cost. Accidents in the workplace can prevent your business from moving forward, as well as deter possible future employees.
In this blog post we'll take a look at what you should do if you're a business owner to ensure that you are creating a safer work environment for employees
Enforce a health and safety culture
The workplace culture you have your employees working in plays a major role in how people behave while at work. You need to make sure you foster a culture that helps employees get through the day safely. This means ensuring that everyone is careful, cautious, and isn’t messing around when there’s heavy machinery around. Promoting this health and safety culture makes it easier to ensure that employees know how to behave, even when they’re not being watched by management.
Provide proper training for a safer work environment
You should never have your employees doing something they’re not properly trained to do, especially when it comes to using equipment or heavy machinery. You might find at times that you are short-staffed, which can happen unexpectedly. In these scenarios, it can be frustrating, but it’s vital that you don’t have anyone fill a position that they are not trained or qualified for. Training ensures that employees are sure of how to fulfill their job role without being a danger to themselves or others around them.
Health screenings
Regular health screenings should be in place to ensure that all employees are healthy and fit for work. Depending on the role, in some cases, it might even be vital to take it a step further and consider safety critical medicals. These assessments will tell you whether or not an employee is physically healthy enough to do a job, or whether or not they’re going to be a danger to them self and others. Having regular health screenings can help you to catch issues early on, as well as accommodate employees who are having unexpected health concerns or scares.
Properly mark hazards
While you might think that certain hazards are easy to see, or you wouldn’t expect anyone to injure themselves around them - it’s important that they are properly marked. Clear signage at these hazards reminds employees that they could be injured if they are not behaving correctly or being careless, and helps anyone new to the workplace to quickly spot what they should be aware of.
You should also be sure that fire exits are properly marked. Even if employees know where to go in an emergency, you don’t know who will be in the workplace when something happens, and it’s important that fire exits can be easily identified.
This same kind of high visibility should also be considered for employees when working in a workplace with vehicles and heavy machinery. Hi-vis jackets help to make sure that no one goes unnoticed, and that there’s much less chance of someone being injured due to a lack of visibility.
Hope this helps
Love Tx