Five employees at our company suffered back injuries in one year.
The good news is that we were able to track what was causing these injuries and what they had in common. We could train workers on how to avoid them.
The bad news: Our employees perform a service at client sites. Getting them together at one time for this training could be difficult.
My suggestion was to have an all-day safety rodeo. We would set up training stations to show employees how to avoid injuries while performing specific tasks. Workers would rotate among the stations.
Make good thing even better
I wanted to make the safety rodeo even better, so I looked into what other resources the company had access to.
Many workers’ compensation insurance companies really want to help their clients prevent employee injuries. So I reached out to ours and invited them to the safety rodeo.
Representatives from the insurance company set up their own station at our safety rodeo to address ergonomic training.
The year after our first safety rodeo, our employees had no back injuries.
We repeat the safety rodeo each year, and we haven’t had any back injuries since.
Our good safety record can be used in competitive bidding for contracts. Our clients want better, safer workers, and our good record helps us win competitive bids.
(Based on a presentation by Todd Smith, Safety Director, Slater Painting, Austin, TX, at ASSP’s Safety 2019)
