Under occupational safety and health laws, your company is required to provide your employees with a safe work environment. You’re responsible for your workers, so you should do everything in your power to ensure that their protection. Following and implementing safety measures not only reduces the risk of accidents but mitigates their impact on your business.
What do you need to do as an employer?
Implement Safety Standards
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) provides a set of workplace safety standards for every industry. These include machine operation regulation, issuing guidelines on routine safety issues, and promoting the significance of education and training to prevent injuries from happening at work.
In Georgia alone, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported 171 cases of workplace accidents in 2018. Transportation accidents resulted in 76 deaths, injuries caused by violence from people and animals accounted for 37 fatalities, while falls, slips, and trips caused 29 fatalities in the state.These three factors account for the deadliest work accidents in the state of Georgia.
You need to prepare for accidents away from the office as well as for the common incidents, like falls, slips, and trips. Provide employees with relevant training programs, like localized fall protection seminars for construction workers, to educate them about how to move around workplace hazards.
Fundamental Safety Measures
Although it’s essential to provide safety measures designed for your unique work environment, you’ll also want to deploy basic practices that keep workers, visitors, and stakeholders safe.
- Reduce the risk of transportation accidents by regularly checking your vehicle
The company should check all company-owned vehicles that are in active use. Ensuring that the cars are all in working order significantly reduces the risk of an accident caused by engine failure or by a machine malfunction.
Additionally, employees should drive responsibly. Strictly enforce rules, from not driving over the speed limit to taking drivers off rotation when they’re sick. A lot of factors play into what causes road accidents, but preventive measures give you some form of control over them.
- Keep workspaces clean
In businesses that work with dangerous chemicals or heavy machinery, a clean and neat workspace is crucial. It reduces the risk of contamination within your workers as well as accidents in the workplace where they slip and fall because of work-related grimes on the floor.
- Educate your employees about workplace safety and install visible signages
Employees need adequate training when they handle any heavy-duty equipment. Brief them about safe handling and what to do in the event of a machine malfunction. Workers also need training in wearing personal protective equipment (PPE). They need to know how to put on, adjust, and take off their gear. They also need to know the limitations of their PPE.
You should also put up signages to remind your employees of what they have to do before they start working. Is it a high-voltage area? Is it a hard-hat area? Could the fumes be toxic when inhaled? Consider all these factors and customize your signages to your operations.
Accidents will happen, but recognizing the hazards in your workplace and developing a safety plan will give you some control. With the right approaches and consistent implementation, you can prevent some incidents and mitigate the impact of others.
