No employee should feel unsafe, regardless of the industry within which they work or the tools they use.

Despite this, there were 30.7 million days lost to work-related ill health and non-fatal workplace injuries during 2017 and 2018.

This begs the question: how safe is your workplace? Can you be sure that every element of the operation encourages a safety-first mindset on behalf of its staff?

The good news is you can make your workplace safer with some tried-and-tested, simple solutions. Here are five of our favourites.

1. Ensure your employees are regularly trained

Training should never be seen as a cost - it’s an investment in the safety of your staff.

In order to prevent workplace injuries, regular HSE (health, safety and environment) training sessions should be offered, whether they’re carried out internally or externally.

This isn’t a fire-and-forget strategy, either. Laws, best practices and the tools your team uses will change over time, and it’s, therefore, essential regular training is provided to keep everyone up-to-speed.

2. Encourage healthy breaks

Sometimes referred to as ‘stretch breaks’, time out from the daily grind is an easy, free way to improve employee health and workplace safety.

Just five minutes away from the desk or machinery for a brief stroll or stretch will ease muscle tension and reduce the potential for motion injuries. It’s also a great way to keep your employees healthy and their minds focused on the tasks in hand.

3. Make it easy for employees to engage with HSE

You won’t spot every health and safety risk in your business, but your team will, collectively.

Ensure there’s an open dialogue for everything health and safety-related. Make this crucial element of your workplace a key part of staff reviews, but also encourage staff to be proactive by reporting concerns whenever they arise.

This is again where training is vital; the more in-tune an employee is with the latest HSE requirements for their role, workplace and industry, the more likely they are to spot hazards that need to be addressed.

4. Have regular equipment and electrical inspections

It’s important for your teams to have the right equipment, but that equipment (be it machinery, tools or computer gear) needs to be safe.

To ensure it is, implement regular electrical inspections and ensure all equipment is checked at the intervals recommended by manufacturers.

Regular cleaning and servicing are also important for certain types of equipment and will go a long way to ensuring your employees work within a safe environment.

5. Make HSE a regular board room conversation

When was the last time you covered health and safety during a board or team leader meeting?

HSE should be a regular item on board meeting agendas. The safety of your workplace is just as important as profit margins, therefore it’s vital you give ample time to discuss any concerns raised by staff and your on-going compliance with industry regulations.

Wrapping up

We hope our advice goes some way to you creating the safest possible workplace, but we can’t underestimate the importance of training.

If you’d like to save on external training and develop people within your own business to become in-house trainers, check out our extensive list of train-the-trainer courses and book yours online, today.