Business owners shouldn’t trifle with the safety and well-being of their employees. Making offices safer, happier, and healthier can increase workers’ productivity. However, statistics indicate that around 340 million occupational accidents take place worldwide. But the saddest thing about workplace accidents is that most of them – fatal and non-fatal alike – are avoidable. This article explains ways to keep the office safe. Follow the suggestions discussed below to avoid workplace injuries.
How to make your workplace better?
Some business owners believe that, since negligent employees cause most workplace accidents, it’s the workforce’s job to stay vigilant all the time. But as an entrepreneur, you shouldn’t forget that it’s the employer’s responsibility to eliminate unsafe working conditions. Legal experts will also inform you that, in most cases, the company is held responsible for workplace injuries. So, negligence can easily make you blameworthy in these situations. Here’s what you need to know to improve workplace health and safety:
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- Get safety professionals on board
Making workplaces healthy is a journey that starts with training workers about safety. But who can educate your employees? Occupation safety is a subject, and distance learning has made it easier to acquire a degree. You can train an occupational safety expert from within your ranks by encouraging them to complete a bachelor degree in occupational health and safety online or hire one with the requisite skills. This will help you lay down the foundation of a proper plan and culture within the organization.
- Hold safety meetings
You shouldn’t hesitate to conduct daily safety meetings. These meetings allow you to discuss new safety guidelines and let your employees bring unsafe working conditions to your attention. You can make the workplace safer by holding safety meetings more frequently than before. Conducting safety meetings regularly will eventually make your workers more careful and vigilant.
- Prepare emergency exits
Accidents can become deadlier when emergency exits aren’t clearly labeled. So, you can easily make the workplace safer by making emergency doors easily accessible. For instance, pathways to these exits are often filled with clutter, making it difficult for people to escape. Moreover, give workers access to shut the machines down in an emergency. With these simple precautions, you can potentially save someone’s life.
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- Encourage good sitting posture
Don’t ignore the ergonomics of a workplace and cater to your workers’ postures. Statistics suggest that 33% of workers take at least one day off work yearly because of neck pain, which is the slightest of all problems caused by a bad seating position. So, you can ask workers to sit at their desks properly. It means their shoulders should line up with their hips, and the screen should be placed at eye level. That’s how your employees can prevent a sedentary lifestyle from ruining their lives forever.
- Encourage regular breaks
Working too hard isn’t healthy, and managers should ask workers to take breaks frequently. It won’t undermine their productivity; instead, it will prevent burnout. Burnout affects many employees today. A Zippia survey suggests that 76% of workers stay tired at work often. Their exhaustion makes them unproductive at work and undermines the workplace’s well-being. So, encouraging regular breaks will recover the productivity levels you’ve lost.
- Conduct equipment inspections
Faulty machines and unguarded appliances cause many workplace hazards. Employees can suffer from abrasions, lacerations, and even amputations when machines aren’t maintained. So, you should conduct regular equipment maintenance to prevent such injuries. Machines should be regularly cleaned and serviced to avoid injurious malfunctions. This maintenance becomes crucial in workshops and such places. Clean and maintain equipment daily if it’s used too often.
- Use labels
Putting up signs and labels can also protect your workers from injury. For instance, around 28% of workers were wounded by falling, slipping, or tripping back in 2019 on construction sites. But you can protect your employees by using labels and informing them of the dangers associated with different places on the premises. These signs have pictures to communicate the risks as reminders to everyone. You can also use these labels to tag potentially dangerous equipment and chemicals.
- Encourage wearing PPE
Wearing personal protective equipment (PPE) can prevent employees from many workplace hazards and ensure their well-being. For instance, employees working with dangerous chemicals can protect themselves by wearing PPE. In 2020, nurses protested against the unavailability of PPE while treating patients with COVID-19. Statistics show that 10% of workplace fatalities are caused by exposure to pollutants. So, these facts show how important wearables have become in today’s polluted workplace environments.
- No drinking
Some workplace fatalities are caused by excessive drinking. Drinking affects a person’s mental agility, so you should introduce a strict no-drinking policy at work. Nobody should drink while working and show up drunk for work in the morning. Promote sobriety at work to reduce the number of workplace accidents. That’s how you can reduce worker-caused accidents.
- Manage workplace stress
When employees are overworked, they can become victims of workplace stress. Surveys indicate that 83% of workers suffer from work-related stress, and many people even miss work because they are stressed. Also, this form of stress is affecting many workers’ domestic bliss. So, how can you help employees overcome workplace stress? Do the following things:
- Promote a healthy work-life balance
- Discourage an excessively sedentary lifestyle
- Encourage them to sleep 7 to 8 hours every night
- Offer nutritious meals and orange juice instead of fast food
- Provide exercise rooms for them where they can meditate sometimes
Conclusion
Creating a healthier workplace isn’t that difficult. You follow OSHA’s guidelines for establishing a safer office, and things will go smoothly on their own. A protected and healthy workforce is more likely to achieve business objectives than one at risk of injury and death or one that falls sick often. So follow the tips mentioned above to make your workplace safer.