As most of you know I’ve been a Safety Consultant/Trainer for over 30 years. I have reviewed hundreds of safety plans during my tenure. I frequently review a “Standardized Safety Plan” that was mass produced for compliance purposes. Employers just add their name and logo to the cover page with a few phone numbers and VIOLA….Safety Program DONE!
I am a firm believer in saving money and not reinventing the wheel. These plans were never meant to be a total remedy for your safety woes and OSHA mandates. They were meant to be the foundation on which to build. These plans are a great start but can’t be your only attempt to sustain your operations and growth. Safety Plans need to be manifold in order to incorporate other needed components of your business plan. If every time you lose or add new employees you have to start over in training the new hires from scratch, you can create a bottleneck in your growth potential. If you can build in Standard Operating Procedures, (SOPs) for tasks that can be standardized and solid guidance techniques for the ones that can’t be, then training new employees can be streamlined and their operational knowledge will be synced with your expectations of quality and safety. Utilize the knowledge of your in-house professionals that you’ve invested a lot of resources and time into getting them to the summit of their job assignments, by having them develop JSAs (Job Safety Analysis) for the tasks that they have mastered. Repetition of great work practices is golden to most employers. It allows for safer and timelier operations that are predictable, more cost effective and reduces Worker’s Comp rates in the long term.
I believe that JSAs are a great tool that will assist you in accomplishing this task.
When properly executed, the JSA will list:
- Step by step instruction of the task
- Potential hazards of each step
- Hazard mitigation procedures
- Tool list
- Safety equipment required for the task
- Troubleshooting techniques
- Key safety awareness points (task specific)
- Approximate time to complete task (optional)*
* A time component can also be added to assist your schedulers in assigning task to maximize your work force.
Access to information is one key to safety and creating a more streamlined process is one key to longevity.
Once the JSA’s are developed, they should be stored in a database for easy accessibility. If anyone with an average knowledge level needed to perform a task that had a complete JSA available, the time to competency for that task would be greatly reduced and a high level of consistency and quality could be maintained.
Any component added to your safety plan that has the ability to reduce injuries is a time worthy investment, including your highly trained staff in its development is priceless.
Please use the “ACCIDENT CALCULATOR” to get an overview of what an accident really cost based on your margins. JSAs are also great training tool for OJT.
Don’t shortcut your safety efforts with online generic video training. Experience the difference with “LIVE” online training. It will make a difference!
