Health and Safety Training Competent to Work Safely?
All persons at work need to be competent in undertaking their various tasks safely. Competence refers to an employees own skills, knowledge and experience with regard to using work equipment and following safe working procedures correctly.
Are your employees, fellow managers or supervisors competent?
Do you, as an employer, have an effective induction training programme and refresher training procedures within your safety management system?
All employers have a duty of care to ensure that risks to health and safety, arising from their business that could result in an injury, are adequately managed.
An effective and practical way to achieve this is by ensuring that your employees are appropriately trained in the work they undertake and, as necessary, ‘supervised’ whilst at work, thus helping to reduce to an acceptable level any risks arising from this work.
By linking the risk assessment, in particular where there are detailed control measures, to the development of an effective workplace training programme, employers can produce a practical approach to achieving worker competence in undertaking tasks.
By following this procedure the employer can identify training needs, develop an appropriate training programme and then roll out suitable and relevant training to the employees. By ensuring the training is relevant to the employee and their work, it can also help to remove some of the myths surrounding health and safety, and the misconception that it is unnecessary.
Once completed and implemented all training undertaken should be reviewed and developed to ensure it is still relevant to the work being undertaken. There is nothing worse than for anyone attending training courses to find them irrelevant to the work they undertake, or that they are too legalistic or high brow to have any value.
More and more employers are reviewing their training needs. Experience from our Field Consultants shows that many clients are following the construction industry style of training and developing – the “tool box” talk format. These are short and sharp presentations in the workplace, dovetailed with shift patterns or specific weekly meetings. Health and safety and new changes to work procedures are always on the agenda, and discussed to ensure consistency and competence in undertaking tasks.
The final piece of the training jigsaw is to document the training undertaken and the subjects covered. These records need to be regularly updated and any additional or refresher training required should be organised.
Peninsula Comment
Competent, effectively trained employees are a benefit to all employers. Reduction in lost time, accidents, ill health, product damage and production time losses can be achieved by having an appropriately trained and skilled workforce.
In summary we recommend that you:
• decide what training your employees need to carry out their tasks; • decide on the priorities of the training and identify those employees in need; • choose an appropriate method of delivering the training; • review the training undertaken and establish its effectiveness; and • refresh those employees as necessary to continually update their skills.