Curated and Custom Safety Programs Yield Results

The #1 challenge in 2019, according to Annual Safety Progress Report conducted by the EHS Daily Advisor, is engaging employees in Safety. Many safety programs are in place, but mostly rendered ineffective due to the absence of the right elements and tools to make them successful.

A well-structured safety program consists of several crucial components: communication, continuing education, behavior-based elements, performance-based recognition, and individual and team-based goal achievements. In addition, a system to track, measure and report on the performance of your program is essential. This is called the Safety Performance Improvement Process (SPIP), which allows for all elements to work in conjunction with one another to accomplish the goals and objectives of the program. It improves engagement, ushers consistency from manager to manager, controls spending, reduces accidents, and creates a ‘best practice’ safety culture, all while improving the return on your safety investment.

Communication is key. Clearly communicating the goals, educating the participants to accomplish those goals, and at the same time, recognizing the participation along the way through positive reinforcement are key to an effective safety program. Continuous communication allows you to maximize and reinforce key safety messages throughout the year, keeping your employees apprised as to what is most important and what safety efforts to focus on.

Safety education reinforcement is critical. Companies spend significant time training employees on everything from processes to specific topics. Reinforcing this safety training through testing allows management to know which employees are engaged, who gets it, who doesn’t, and where to place additional emphasis. It also allows them to recognize their employees for performance and proficiency on the safety topics.

Incorporate three essential pieces. As you design your safety program, it is essential to include educational, behavior-based, and performance components for the program to be most effective. Examples of educational elements include online learning or attending a safety course; behavioral-based elements can be as simple as including your employees’ safety suggestions, and the performance piece recognizes achievements of both individuals and teams with rewards. Goal setting and emotion are powerful motivators in driving performance. Awards have an emotional connection and motivate employees, so when it comes to rewards, offer a wide variety with input from employees. Incorporating these three components will produce results and keep your employees engaged over a longer period of time thus strengthening your safety culture.

Is it working? The last piece of the program is track, measure and report milestones. An effective way to document the results is with an Online Management System (OMS). These systems house your employee database to track the program at a macro level; company, division and district, down to the micro level; business unit, manager, supervisor and employee. It can also keep track of when to recognize and reward employees. Most are affordable, easy to set-up and user-friendly.

Fill in the gap. To design a safety program, companies should begin by performing a comprehensive review of the elements currently in place. Once deficiencies are identified, conduct a Gap Analysis of the Performance Improvement Process so that those specific areas are targeted and improved. Over time, an effective safety program will become ingrained in company culture and help protect your most valued resource, your employees.

Blog authored by Karen McClenny of KMC Incentives, a company devoted to workplace performance improvement. More at kmcincentives.com.