Even if you’ve just started a business or are a well-established manager, you’ll know that the safety of your company, staff, and business is crucial.
Whether it’s an injury or fraud, an unsafe work environment could quickly ruin the reputation of your business or add financial strain when dealing with fines or lawsuits.
Everything from keeping employees happy and healthy, improving customer satisfaction, and ensuring safety compliance within the workplace are all parts of work safety. To help, we’re sharing a few tips to help you make your business a happier, healthier, and safer place to work.
1. Create The Rules, Put Them In Writing
The best way to keep everyone on the same page is to make rules and put them in writing. Ensure everyone has a copy of the rules when it comes to safety so that there is no level of miscommunication that could become a risk later down the line. Copies should also be provided to any new staff and visitors if required.
Adding a statement about your business’s safety policies and continued commitment to safety will also help for official audits.
2. Provide Training
Giving each employee a copy of the rules isn’t enough to ensure that they will be followed. Regular training should be provided regarding safety in the workplace, data handling, fraud, and malware. Training should then be followed up with a few questions to ensure that staff have taken in the information.
3. Get Insured
When safeguarding your business, ensuring customer satisfaction goes a long way. With disgruntled and unhappy customers, you could find yourself with a lawsuit on your hands. If a customer or client thinks your business has led to them losing money or has jeopardized their own business, you’ll likely be sent to court or required to pay a settlement. As an extra layer of protection, businesses should take out professional liability insurance.
4. Continuously Focus On Safety
Even when your staff are trained, your business is insured, and the rules are written in print, the job is not done. Keeping a focus on safety through the day-to-day running of the job will ensure everyone stays on high alert of potential risks. You should also provide refresher courses for training and have risk assessments and inspections in place regularly so that compliance never drops.
5. Keep Records Up To Date
When creating a risk assessment, it’s integral that records for risks and hazards are kept up to date. If situations or injuries have occurred, thorough documentation should be available after strict investigation. How did the incident occur? What was the result? How can this be fixed for the future?
Investigation scenarios will require you to also interview witnesses and other employees to ensure you have the full picture. Keeping all of this on record will help you to move forward, create new rules, and prevent similar situations in the future.
Safety in and out of the workplace is everyone’s responsibility. But as a business owner, it’s your job to ensure everyone stays focused.
