An article in Michigan Manufacturing Magazine entitled “Safety as a Business Outcome” talks about how safety is not just an absence of injuries nor an outside process. The author Phil La Duke states that instead safety should be viewed as the output of sound business practices. When safety is ingrained within company’s procedures and processes it creates a more efficient workplace.
What areas within an organization can become the main focus for safety to become embedded within procedures? The article specifies these:
- Competency: Making sure that the people you hire are fully competent to complete the job they are hired for will help ensure that they will also do the job safely. If an employee is under qualified and unable to perform the job duty there is no doubt that it will most likely not be performed safely.
- Operations Ownership: The article states that safety should be viewed as criteria for how well operations management is running and how efficient it is. Operations should look at safety as a controllable indicator of efficiency.
- Hazard Management: Every workplace has hazards. These hazards need to be identified and corrected before a worker gets hurt.
- Process Capability: There should be a standard way of doing a process. If a process has many variations within it and people are performing the same job in different ways hazards and injury are bound to incur.
- Engagement: Taking pride in their jobs because they are engaged will influence a worker to do the right thing.
- Accountability: Workers should be held accountable for playing a role in the total safety of the company.
SLIPNOT products can help embed safety into everyday operations. By replacing slippery flooring and subpar products with long lasting slip resistant products hazards can be avoided and worker confidence and pride can be increased. Making safety part of a business’s output as instructed by this article may help all areas involved.
La Duke, Phil. “Safety as a Business Output.” www.mimfg.org. June 2015. June 29, 2015. http://mag.mimfg.org/mag/0066591001434374150?feature=archive
