It is not often that Safety Snippets happen to come in two installments.

Wait, never mind that. This is unprecedented. Every once in a while, even I don’t mind when my little blog makes a little history.

In the previous post, I started cleaning off my desk by adding a couple of brief safety items, and this week I will continue that theme as a way to start the first full month of fall. I call it fall cleaning. In this edition, we’ll look into the top stress-inducers iat work, and note new safety program guidelines that went into effect this year.

Risk Factory street sign

Stressing the Obvious?

A survey of about 1,500 “knowledge” workers by Wrike, a project-management software company, revealed te five biggest contributors to workplace stress. A couple of these will not be a surprise, but perhaps a couple others may give some of us pause.

Why is this important? There has been a mounting set of evidence that stress greatly impacts productivity and worker health in a negative way, which impacts the bottom line for many companies. Identifying stress and mitigating it in the workplace is not just a health issue, but it is also an economic and financial stability issue.Here are results of the survey, listing the five biggest reported stressors according to these workers, in reverse order:

  1. Vague leadership. It is one thing if you are on the same general page with your boss in terms of culture in the workplace and your goals for the future, but ethereal platitudes do not get to the heart of the work, which is the day-to-day progress. Work on having very clear communication between workers and supervisors to eliminate confusion, and supervisors need to be open to answering any worker’s questions that will help them understand better what you expect from them.
  2. Guideline, not deadline. “Moving the goal posts” is a phrase that implies some unfairness. And when you move deadlines around for whatever reason, it tends to be unfair to your workers and it affects morale. Be rock-firm in your deadlines, but make sure to account for any delays or obstacles that may get in the way of the project being completed, and be sensitive to the workers and their abilities. Make sure there is darn good reason to move a deadline. Workers like having the certainty of knowing when they are expected to have the work done.
  3. Unreality. A common thread through these is communication, and this refers to having unrealistic expectations. How can this happen? When a boss and worker don’t understand the worker’s workload and what he or she is doing, while the boss expects a project to be done in certain timeframe that seems untenable. Proper and frequent communication between boss and supervisor can help with making expectations more realistic for the worker and thus make the boss happier.
  4. Priorities. Not understanding the importance of one task over another, or making the wrong decision as to which project to handle first, can generate an awful lot of stress. Work with your boss to ensure you have your jobs in the right priority order so they all get done on time – even if they seem to have overlapping deadlines. Understand your worker’s reasons for his or her priorities, and have him or her understand why your priorities are different, and meet in the middle whenever possible.
  5. Omission. A worker can have all the motivation and energy needed to get a job done, but if he or she doesn’t have all the information necessary – including resources, obstacles and possible frustrations – that can lead to a lack of energy and productivity, and perhaps leave workers confused and tentative with future projects. Be clear with instructions, and help the worker see the project from as many different angles as possible so all the possible deterrents are seen and addressed.

For more about this survey, visit this link.

Managing Safety Culture

The management of a safety program in the workplace is vitally important in most industries, and even in many companies. There is all kinds of evidence that those who are great at safety happen to be the most productive and successful companies (at least, based on the rise in their stock prices over the years).

However, it can seem to be difficult to have a uniform program that is industry-neutral, as every industry has varying levels of risk for varying groups of workers. And while each industry and even company within an industry will have variations of a safety program, there can always be a consistency and uniformity to how a safety program is managed and executed. And that has been on the record at OSHA for decades.

OSHA developed the initial Safety and Health Program Management Guidelines in 1989, and the guidelines finally underwent a refresh. These new guidelines take into account best practices over the last 25 years, with feedback and input from results of the Voluntary Protection Programs and the Safety and Health Achievement Recognition Program, both headed by OSHA.

The guidelines were designed for small- and medium-sized businesses to address safety hazards in their workplaces before they cause significant injuries, illnesses or deaths. As many know, the prevention factor in safety is much more cost-effective than the reactive work after an incident occurs. And excessive costs tend to derail many small businesses from expanding and becoming big businesses – or even keeping their doors open in the first place.

You can check out the new safety program-management guidelines at this link.