May 19, 2010

Supervisors are lynchpins in any good safety program. Here are a few tips that can help you get the most from your supervisors when it comes to safety:

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1. Review your disciplinary program: There are few people who enjoy disciplining employees. Because it's such a distasteful task, how and when to discipline an employee who has violated a safety rule is something that should be reviewed regularly with supervisors, as well as the importance of doing so--supervisors who understand that correctly applied discipline is in the best interest of both the employee and employer are more likely to use it when it becomes necessary.

When reviewing your policy, encourage supervisors to talk to HR about situations where they may be unsure about the proper resolution. For example, should having to repeatedly tell an employee to wear his or her safety eyewear be a formal disciplinary issue? Or are there any safety infractions that warrant immediate dismissal, and what do those that look like? Regular review and discussion of how your disciplinary policy interfaces with safety will help your supervisors apply it consistently, fairly, and effectively.

2. Train the trainer: Supervisors are often called upon to provide safety training to workers—particularly on-the-job training—so don't forget to attend to their training needs. While your supervisors don't necessarily need to become safety experts, in order to be comfortable with training, supervisors will need a level of knowledge that allows them to comfortably answer many of their workers' safety questions.

Having to say "I don't know" or "let me ask someone" every time an employee asks a question about safety will not only undermine the supervisor's confidence, but it can also erode his or her authority when it comes to enforcing safety rules.

In addition to a solid working knowledge of safety in the workplace, ensure that your supervisors have basic skills in how to deliver good training—beefing up your supervisors' training delivery skills will help ensure that employee safety training doesn't consist merely of a mumbled recitation of a checklist at the end of the weekly crew meeting.

3. Review supervisor safety performance: What gets attention is what gets done in the workplace, so if you want supervisors to address worker safety, you need to pay attention to what they're doing when it comes to safety.

Reviewing your supervisors' safety performance can help them be more effective by clarifying expectations and focusing effort. The performance parameters you can evaluate are almost infinite, but here are a few you may want to consider when evaluating a supervisor's safety performance:

• Percentage of workers who are current on their required safety training
• Whether required inspections are completed, and completed in a timely fashion
• Quality of incident investigations completed
• Housekeeping in the work area
• Time it takes for a safety issue to be addressed once it's reported
• Supervisor compliance with safety rules
• Observed safety-rule compliance for employees in the supervisor's work area

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