Best Ways to Manage Workplace Health and Safety Systems

For manufacturing and construction companies, workplace health and safety typically come down to commitment. Company leaders need to make a concerted effort to create a safe work environment for their workers. However, commitment is only part of the battle.

Health and safety systems in the workplace also need organization and management. Creating a safe workplace requires a certain level of execution to ensure everything is running smoothly. With that in mind, we felt compelled to share some of the best ways that company leaders can manage workplace health and safety systems.

Align Safety with Company Goals

Most of the time, health and safety systems need to be aligned with a company’s other goals. Too many times, a company’s objectives for production, profit, and growth are seen as being in conflict with workplace safety. Instead, every company goal, safety and otherwise, needs to be under the same umbrella.

The company leaders who are setting the standards for profits need to be the same people setting the standards for safety. Performance indicators for workplace safety need to be given equal weight to the company’s bottom line. It should all count the same because no business should be considered successful if it profits at the expense of the health and safety of its employees. There must be full integration of the safety and financial goals of a business.

Prioritize Compliance Issues

If a business can stay up to date on compliance, it will never fall behind when it comes to workplace safety. The health and safety systems utilized by companies should make it a priority to understand all safety regulations in their locality and remain in compliance with them. That should always be the base-level goal for any business. Once a company gets to the point where it’s meeting all compliance regulations, health and safety become much easier to manage. It’s then possible to focus on more ambitious health and safety goals that are company-specific and geared toward achieving the large-scale objectives of that business.

Make Employees Part of the Process

Workplace health and safety systems shouldn’t dictate behavior to employees. That will make it far more difficult to get workers to buy into following safety protocols and meeting safety standards. Instead, employees need to be brought into the process, offering insight and suggestions for how to create a safer workplace. Involving employees reinforces the fact that safety is a team effort, which increases accountability.

This also means making sure workers are in the loop when there are inspections scheduled, minor accidents, and any other safety-related events. More than anything else, it’s critical that everyone at the company is on the same page, meaning frontline workers need to be an integral part of health and safety systems.

Always Strive to Do Better

It may be discouraging to hear, but health and safety systems are never a finished product. Every business must constantly be striving to make improvements to the way safety is handled. This means conducting internal audits and reviewing your safety procedures. It means investigating all accidents, big and small, as well as close calls. It also means keeping records of all accidents, training sessions, inspections, and any other safety-related information. The more information you gather regarding safety, the easier it will be to find ways that company health and safety systems can be improved.

Seek Outside Help and Support

When health and safety are involved, it never hurts to ask for outside help. For instance, EHS Insight’s safety management system can do wonders for organizing and managing workplace safety. Everything safety-related will be placed under the same umbrella, leading to a more cohesive and structured approach to safety.

If you think this could help your company, give us a call and we’ll be happy to explain how our software can improve your approach to workplace safety.