Construction Safety: It's a Habit, Not a Hobby
Posted by Debbi Kuhne on Fri, Jul 09, 2010 @ 09:03 AM
You don’t wake up one day saying to yourself “From now on I’ll be safe”. Being safe is being aware, it’s a learned activity and it becomes a habit. Do you lock the doors in your home? Do you look both ways when crossing a street? These were things that were brought to your attention as safety hazards, you learned what the proper way to prevent an injury was and it became habit. You need to do the same thing with Workplace and Construction Jobsite Safety!
Awareness is the first step in the process. Do your employees know the hazards of the jobsite? You might want to include discussion of the specific job site hazards in your weekly toolbox talks.
The next step is training. If an employee is working in an unsafe manor, allowing him or her to continue will not bring safety to the workplace. Nor will just yelling at them or disciplining them for being unsafe. You need to advise the employee of the unsafe operation and teach them how to do it safely and properly.
The final step is reinforcement of proper and safe workhabits. I have heard that it takes 2 weeks to form a new habit and 2 weeks to break an old one. So, reinforcement and reminders will help to make safe workplace practices the new habit on your jobsites!
Think of the upside to preventing construction injuries:
- Not having to deal with an insurance claim
- Not having an increase in your construction insurance premiums because of the claim
- Not having OSHA visit to investigate the claim
- Keeping your experience mod low, and in doing so not hurting your ability to bid jobs or work for specific general contractors
- Not having to spend money to replace and retrain a new worker to replace the injured one